Danaos orders five Post-Panamax boxships

The Greek shipping company Danaos Corporation has signed shipbuilding contracts for five 6,500 TEU vessels with Hanjin Heavy Industries & Construction Co., Ltd. These containerships are expected to be delivered to Danaos in late 2009 and throughout June 2010.

The capital expenditure commitment, which is in the region of $500 million, will be financed by existing credit facilities and own funds according to work in progress under the specific terms of the shipbuilding contracts. Danaos also arranged for 15-year charters for three of these vessels with the Yang Ming Group.

This new order increases Danaos’ total order-book to 23 containerships with a total carrying capacity of 130,524 TEU or 94% of its current fleet.

“This acquisition is one further step in our development,” said Dr. Coustas, Chief Executive Officer of Danaos. “We have a number of excellent Hanjin Heavy Industries built vessels in our fleet, and it was now time to further our relationship with a solid order of five Post-Panamax containerships. Danaos will take delivery of these vessels from November of 2009 until June 2010, at a time when building berths for large containerships around the world are becoming increasingly hard to find. The vessels will be powered by Korean built diesel electric engines providing improved efficiency, lower emissions and with a design speed of 25.6 knots. Three of these vessels have been chartered by our long time customer, Yang Ming Line, increasing our contracted revenue by $550 million to about $3.5 billion.”