Orient Overseas Container Line
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The Orient Overseas Container Line (OOCL) is a Hong Kong-based containerized shipping and logistics service company. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Orient Overseas (International) Limited (OOIL) SEHK: 0316.
The OOCL was founded by C. Y. Tung In 1947 as the Orient Overseas Line. It changed its name into Orient Overseas Container Line in 1969, when it began the process of containerization.
At its peak the OOCL had a shipping fleet with over 150 freight ships, with its cargo capacity exceeding 10 million tons; it was one of the world's top seven shipping lines. At one stage it also owned the Seawise Giant, the largest ship ever built.
The OOCL did suffer major setbacks throughout its history, the first during the early 1970s. In September of 1970, he bought the famous oceanliner RMS Queen Elizabeth to convert it into a floating university, to be known as Seawise University, to keep the World Campus Afloat program alive. On January 9, 1972, the ship caught on fire during refurbishing and sank into Hong Kong's Victoria Harbour; the wreckage had to be scrapped three years later.
After C. Y. Tung's death in 1982, the OOCL was caught in the downturn of the global shipping industry, and went into financial trouble. The OOCL, which previously had close ties with the Kuomintang regime of the Republic of China on Taiwan, was instead bailed out by the government of the People's Republic of China. This paved the way for C. Y. Tung's son and successor, C. H. Tung, to become the Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China in 1997; the leadership of the company was in turn passed onto C. H. Tung's brother, C. C. Tung.
Today, OOCL remains one of the world's major shipping and logistics companies, with over 68 vessels and 6,000 staff in 50 countries.
[edit] Trivia
- The company emblem of the OOCL is a plum blossom, the national flower of the Republic of China.
- In the past, all important or large ships of the OOCL had names that began with the word "Seawise", which was a pun on C. Y. Tung's initials.
- Cargo liners or containerships began mostly with the word "Oriental" and since 1989 with the word "OOCL".
- OOCL Shenzhen (yard No. 1418) is the first in a fleet of twelve SX-class vessels which are to be fabricated by Samsung Heavy Industries Co. Ltd. of South Korea and delivered to OOCL by the end of 2007. Other SX-class vessels in service include, in chronological order, OOCL Long Beach, OCCL Rotterdam, OCCL Hamburg, OCCL Qingdao, OCCL Ningbo, OOCL Atlanta, OOCL Tianjin.
