Hapag-Lloyd runs 300 vessels across 133 liner services, moving 13.5 million TEU a year between 600 ports — the fifth-largest container carrier in the world. At that scale, a single operational call on one ship ripples through thousands of containers.
Patrick Briest, the carrier's Senior Director of Operations and IT Products, framed digitalisation around one word at an industry seminar during SMM 2026: simplicity. The targets are concrete — keep network schedule reliability above 90%, cut emissions per TEU by 30% by 2030, approach net zero by 2045, and take roughly $100 per TEU out of operating costs.
Briest walked through a notional voyage carrying perishables from South America's west coast to Northern Europe. A crane failure at the final South American call could cost the vessel its Panama Canal slot; pulling data from the digital cargo logbook lets the company calculate exactly how long to extend the call to maximise intake without losing the slot. Later, in heavy Atlantic weather, shipboard data combined with shore analysis would feed decisions on routing, speed, fuel burn and arrival options.
The most direct customer-facing piece is reefer visibility. Hapag-Lloyd's LIVE tool lets shippers monitor refrigerated cargo and, when a vessel is delayed, adjust temperature settings remotely to protect the cargo. "By being more digital, we want to be as easy to do business with for our customers as we possibly can be," Briest said.
More connectivity means more exposure. Briest acknowledged the attack surface grows substantially as systems are linked, and the company now pushes 100 to 200 patches to every vessel each week. Cybersecurity, he said, cannot be an afterthought — it has to be secure by design. The other guardrail is crew capability: digitalisation should strengthen, not erode, seafarers' judgement and practical skills.
For Chinese exporters booking Hapag-Lloyd slots, the near-term effects show up in reefer handling and schedule reliability — earlier warning when a vessel slips, remote temperature control for cold chain cargo. Whether the $100 per TEU cost reduction reaches freight rates depends on capacity and demand down the line.