CSBC takes hard line on delay requests

Taiwan’s largest shipbuilder CSBC Corp said it would take a harder stance toward shipowners seeking to delay deliveries.

CSBC was hard hit by newbuilding delivery delays in the first seven months this year.

Compatriot container line Yang Ming Marine pushed back the delivery of 14 boxships by six months to 15 months in July this year. CSBC also agreed to delay delivery of 24 containerships by four to 16 months for Germany’s Peter Dohle Schiffahrts-KG and Taiwan’s Wai Hai Lines.

“We will reject the shipping companies’ requests if they want to make further delay in delivery,” CSBC president Li Chih-cheng said. He said the shipping market had begun to improve and the company had bagged new orders in the third quarter including the contract to build four 93,000-dwt coal carriers for Taiwan Power Co, worth a total of $186.6m in July.

“If the companies still want to take advantage of recession to push down newbuilding price or postpone their orders, I think this act is selfish and it is not acceptable. We would rather cancel the deal,” he said.

Li said their customers understood the situation and agreed to its stance. CSBC had not received any new order cancellations after Israel’s Zim Integrated Shipping Services cancelled an order of six 1,700-teu ships at the cost of $220.4m in April, he said. The shipbuilder currently has an order backlog of 79 vessels in their shipyards in Kaohsiung and Keelung with a total value of TWD 110bn.