Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) has established a new industry milestone for the highest market share ever achieved by a single container line, based on Alphaliner figures. The Swiss operator captured 21.5% of worldwide container capacity in May, a threshold that no other carrier has come close to reaching throughout the sector’s past.

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The sole earlier benchmark worth noting was Maersk’s 19.3% share in 2018, itself a consequence of that Danish firm’s aggressive consolidation strategy. MSC has now exceeded that mark by over two percentage points. According to Alphaliner’s most recent ranking on June 9, MSC’s fleet has expanded to 7.329m teu, representing 21.6% of the global market. MSC has essentially doubled its proportion since 2010.

The Swiss line’s progression from a solid but conventional runner-up to a structurally dominant industry leader was founded on a tactic that its rivals opted not to emulate: converting pandemic-era cash flow into tangible assets at a speed and magnitude the container industry had never witnessed before.

MSC initiated its acquisition campaign in August 2020, buying secondhand tonnage from non-operating owners while competitors deliberated over capital restraint. By November 2025, Splash estimated the cumulative secondhand count at 461 vessels. Concurrently, its newbuilding initiative delivered 54 ships totaling 695,185 teu in 2025 alone, driving total capacity additions that year to 831,400 teu. This represented fleet expansion of 11.7% in a single twelve-month span, compared with 7.3% across the top 12 carriers combined.

Accumulating the fleet was a method, not the ultimate goal. When MSC and Maersk declared the termination of their 2M alliance in January 2023, with an exit date scheduled for February 2025, MSC utilized the subsequent two years to prepare for functioning without alliance support. Its independent east-west network, revealed in September 2024 and launched the following February, provided 34 loops across five trades with both Suez and Cape of Good Hope itineraries. A slot-exchange arrangement with the Premier Alliance on Asia-Europe routes gave it cooperative access without reliance. MSC’s own evaluation was unequivocal: it asserted that it possessed the fleet size and capability to function as an alliance-free carrier.

The vertical aspect of MSC’s growth has been similarly intentional. It increased its ownership in terminal operator TiL to 60% in 2019, purchased Brazil’s Log-In Logistica in 2021, finalized the EUR5.7bn acquisition of Bollore Africa Logistics in 2022—subsequently rebranded AGL—and obtained a minority interest in Hamburg’s HHLA in 2024. The combined outcome was to broaden MSC’s reach from the dock through inland logistics networks in Europe, Latin America and Africa, strengthening its hold on cargo movements at both ends of the supply chain.

Competitors followed notably different approaches. Maersk, for example, advanced its integrator model and established the Gemini Cooperation with Hapag-Lloyd, emphasizing dependability over sheer capacity expansion.

The concentration pattern goes beyond MSC alone. The ten largest container carriers collectively accounted for 84.8% of global capacity in January 2021, an all-time peak reached as the major lines proved uniquely positioned to benefit from pandemic disruptions. Nearly 500,000 teu in newbuilding tonnage was delivered to those same ten carriers in the five months from December to April this year, raising their combined share to 84.7% of the total market at end-May—just 0.1 percentage points below the all-time record, per Alphaliner.

Source: IndexBox Market Intelligence Platform