News / Hede Shipping rejigs transpac feeder service to target growing ecommerce

Hede Shipping has altered the rotation of its China-US West Coast express (HEX2) service between Ningbo and Los Angeles.

HEX2 will now start at Huanghua and call at Shanghai before LA, making it the first transpacific service at Huanghua, in Hebei province.

The revamp aims to provide a faster connection between the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region (known as the Jing-Jin-Ji cluster) and the US.

The new route, shorter than conventional Asia-USWC services by seven to nine days, targets e-commerce cargo, particularly from merchants in northern China, and Hede claims to have exclusive berths and owned racks in LA’s West Basin Container Terminal, enabling containers to be collected and returned quickly.

The Chinese government wants to develop the Jing-Jin-Ji cluster, around the Bohai Sea, as an economic region.

The first voyage of the adjusted HEX2 took place on Sunday, with the 1,800 teu Androklis departing Huanghua, scheduled to arrive in Los Angeles on 5 December. The next voyage will see the 1,800 teu Adamastos set out on 25 November; both ships are chartered from Capital Maritime & Trading.

HEX2 currently deploys five 1,700-2,800 teu ships, with a sixth expected to be added, as the revamp increases the voyage rotation from 35 days to 42.

Hede chairman Li Wenyong said: “We want to become an ocean-going express shipping brand, focused on growing Hebei’s economy and contributing to the advancement of Hebei ports.”

A subsidiary of Hebei Port Group, it started as an intra-Asia carrier and launched transpacific services in March. Since then, Hede, now the 26th-largest liner operator with 72,300 teu of capacity, has carried more than 10,000 teu to the US on chartered feeder vessels.