Hamburg-headquartered Hapag-Lloyd has confirmed that it is in advanced negotiations to acquire Israeli flag carrier ZIM Integrated Shipping Services.
Private equity investor FIMI Opportunity Funds of Israel is said to be part of the purchase, which comes at a time of mixed fortunes for the volatile line.
In 2020, as the shipping industry was factoring in serious setbacks related to the COVID-19 pandemic, ZIM recorded baseline figures of $3.99 billion in revenue.
Amid early pandemic surges, $518 million of that was net income. In the years immediately after the annus horribilis of global market lockdowns, ZIM proved to be one of the more resilient lines, yielding comparatively strong growth of $10.73bn in 2021 and $12.56bn in 2022. Net profits increased from $3.99bn to $4.64bn in 2021.
The following year, there was a slight tapering off in net profit, down to $4.62bn.
Then came 2023, with revenue of $5.16bn but profits were eroded by net losses of $2.70bn.
In 2024 and ’25, there was some recovery as ZIM’s revenue rebounded to $8.43bn, of which $2.15bn was profit, followed by relatively strong momentum in 2025, despite upsets to sustained volume because of the situation in the Red Sea.
Offloading the line clearly poses a strategic asset risk for Israel, hence the involvement of FIMI, giving Tel Aviv hedging leverage.
Of the line’s 4 800 employees, a significant number are opposed to Hapag-Lloyd’s purchase of ZIM because Qatar Investment Authority and Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund hold at least one-third of the German line’s shares.
The ZIM purchase offer comes at a strategic time for the re-emergence of the Suez Canal as a waterway option in East-West trade. Although ZIM is only ranked 10th among much bigger lines, its capacity of 704 000 TEUs and its location at the Port of Haifa could substantially bolster Hapag-Lloyd’s service offering in the Middle East, especially as a vessel-sharing (VS) partner of Maersk, its co-member in the Gemini Cooperation alliance.
Although the purchase will only be concluded in 2027, early indications are that ZIM’s acquisition by Hapag-Lloyd will strengthen Gemini’s position as a Suez-sailing entity, as the next-closest VS grouping, Primary Alliance (Ocean Network Express [ONE], Evergreen Marine, HMM and Yang Ming), is already lagging behind in capacity.
ONE is the fifth-largest line by order of capacity, placed after Hapag-Lloyd. The top three TEU lines are MSC, CMA CGM and Maersk, in that order.
