RCL outlines strategy to grow business in 2H/2021, expanding its vessel fleet and signaling readiness to serve high demand

Regional Container Lines Public Company Limited (RCL), a Thai intra-Asian container shipping line, aims to follow its business plan in the second half of 2021 with strategy to drive exports and buy five ships throughout the year. Among the five ships, the first two have a capacity of 6,000 TEU, the other two have a capacity of 3,000 TEU and the last 1 has a capacity of 1,500 TEU. In Early August, the company signed an agreement to build two 12,000 TEU ships to serve an upcycle of the container shipping industry over the next 1-2 years. Meanwhile, RCL has supported Sea Group to transport 1,500 oxygen tanks from China to help Covid patients in Thailand, which is part of its CSR activities to help the society.

Mr. Twinchok Tanthuwanit, Senior Vice President Chief of Regions & Business Development of RCL, reveals that for the second quarter of 2021, the company posted its net profit of 3.2 billion baht, or surging 14 times from the same period last year. The container shipping business has growth opportunities following a surge of demand for durable goods, medical supplies, and e-commerce products triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic, and this rising trend will continue in the third and fourth quarters of this year. In addition, congestions at major ports around the world have magnified the impact of this phenomenon, leading to container and ship insufficiency and higher sea freight.

Therefore, RCL sees the highest growth opportunity of exported good quantity in Asia in the near term, which is backed by three pillars of China, ASEAN, and India. So, the company is interested to strengthen its vessel fleet to provide more container shipping service in this region.

In addition to the sea freight business, RCL also provides a full range of services such as port and warehouse management, container yard, inland and sea transport in the country, as well as expanding logistics services in other Asian countries such as China and India.

Apart from building business growth, the company has its policy to help mitigate the Covid-19 impact by supporting Sea Group (Garena, Shopee, SeaMoney) to transport 1,500 oxygen tanks from China by METHI BHUM ship to help Covid patients in Thailand. It is responsible for shipping expenses and import formalities and duties, as well as planning to support a delivery of oxygen tanks and its transportation cost to hospitals in need by September. All these works are part of its activities to help the society during the pandemic.

“For accurate management and quick response to the competitive business environment, it is necessary for us to bring in IT technologies such as the development of central system that can create a new program for RCL and the robotic system to accelerate repeating works. And Business Intelligence, the center of operational data from various sections, will support management and comprehensive and fast problem solving as well as planning more accurately,’’ Mr. Twinchok concluded.

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About RCL

Founded in 1979, RCL is a Thai based container shipping line. Listed on the Thai Stock Exchange since 1988, its core business is in the carriage of Shipper owned containers (SOC) and its own Carrier container containers (COC) in a service network that is fully Asia centric. RCL currently owns and operates a fleet of 48 vessels with sizes ranging between 200 TEUs and 6621 TEUs. It also has a fleet of 122,422 TEUs to support its own COC carriage as well. RCL operates a network of 69 offices made up of both owned and agency partner offices to support its operations. Today, RCL is recognised as amongst the leading SOC and Intra Asian operator by both peers and customers alike.