After the failure of Haijing Shipping, the world opens its eyes to the crisis of the shipping business On August 31st 2016, the colossus Hanjin Shipping, a South Korean container line, filed for bankruptcy leaving 66 ships, carrying goods worth $14.5 billion in the sea. This is not an isolated instance, since of the biggest twelve shipping companies that have published results for the past quarter, eleven have announced huge losses. And even the strongest, likeMaersk Line, is suffering. The reason for this great loss of profit lies in the ebbing of world trade since the financial crisis and in the overcapacity of the container market that creates a huge reduction of shipping costs. Eyes are trained on the industry leader Maersk Group. In June, Maersk Group’s chairman, Michael Pram Rasmussen, fired Nils Smedegaard Andersen, its CEO, and replaced him with Soren Skou. Mr. Skou seeks for a review on the company on how to rule the Maersk Group’s subsidiaries. Maersk Group’s big new idea is to make its existing ships smarter and more technological. The Danish firm’s three-year-old analytics team has also worked on discovering the optimal speed and course for its ships to save money and fuel. What Maersk is doing in digitalization his business is likely to be followed by its’ competitors. It is true that this digitalization alone won’t save the industry from the crisis of the sector, but it may prepare it better for the next one. The gLAWcal Team LIBEAC project Friday, 30 September 2016 (Source: The Economist)