A unit of French shipping company CMA CGM that owns and charters containerships, said today it will be acquired by Marathon Acquisition Corp., and become a public company "to create a strong platform for growth."
The CMA CGM subsidiary, Global Ship Lease Inc., is incorporated in the Marshall Islands and owns 12 ships and has contracts in place to purchase five ships from CMA CGM, which are to be delivered from December to July 2009. All told, those 17 ships have capacities of 66,297 TEUs and all are under long-term charters to CMA CGM with an average remaining charter term of about 11 years.
Global Ship Lease will be purchased by Marathon Acquisition Corp., a "blank check" or "special purpose acquisition company" that was formed in 2006 by Michael Gross, a former executive at Apollo Management, the company that created CEVA Logistics.
Marathon will pay about $1 billion for Global Ship Lease. When the deal is completed, Marathon's shareholders will own two-thirds of the company and CMA CGM will have a 34 percent stake.
Marathon, which is listed on the American Stock Exchange, plans to take on the Global Ship Lease name and list its shares on the New York Stock Exchange.
"This is a logical next step in the development of our company and we are excited to merge into Marathon as Global Ship Lease enters its next phase of growth. This transaction represents a significant opportunity to continue to expand our fleet and our customer base," said Ian Webber, chief executive officer of Global Ship Lease.
"The container-shipping industry is high growth, benefiting from and providing stimulus to changes in world trade because of the advantages it offers in terms of cost, security, efficiency and speed. We believe that this is an exciting time for containership charter owners as the industry looks to increasing levels of capital investment," Webber said.
While containership chartering has long been dominated by so-called German "KG" partnerships, in recent years a number of high-profile public companies have entered the business of owning and leasing containerships, including Seaspan Corp., Danaos Corp., and Rickmers Maritime.
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