Hapag-Lloyd Launches Real-Time Container Tracking

Hapag-Lloyd has launched real-time container tracking on most of its nearly 3 million strong fleet, becoming the first container shipping line to introduce a fleet-wide dry container tracking product.

With “Live Position”, Hapag-Lloyd customers can now track their shipments from their origin until arrival at the destination. The company has already equipped over two-thirds of their dry container fleets with tracking devices, with installations continuing to ensure complete coverage by this summer.

“It does close the blind spots of global logistics, enabling real-time decision-making and risk mitigation for our customers, while allowing a more efficient steering of our fleet of boxes,” said Dr. Maximilian Rothkopf, Hapag-Lloyd COO.

Hapag-Lloyd announced its goal to become the first shipping company to outfit all of its standard shipping containers with real-time monitoring in April 2022, with initial installations starting later that year. The installed IoT devices can transmit real-time data such as GPS-based location data, temperature measurements, and monitor for sudden vibrations.

“The participants of our successful pilot phase have already acknowledged that we are going the extra mile to eliminate one of their greatest concerns. Now we would like to take all our customers on this journey to further develop this product,” said Henrik Schilling, Head of Global Commercial Development. “We are currently working on feeding the tracking data into the customers’ operational systems via API. Another milestone for advancing the product will be the Estimated Time of Arrival (ETA) Prediction.”

Hapag-Lloyd had first introduced real-time monitoring of its reefer container fleet in 2019. The company initially planned to make this available to standard shipping containers by early 2023, aiming to track its entire dry container fleet by the end of 2023.

Hapag-Lloyd has collaborated with the well-known TradeTech company Nexxiot AG and ORBCOMM on the initiative.

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