Color Line poised to enter cruise market

Aker Yards is at work on designs for a large pure cruiseship for Norwegian cruise ropax specialist Color Line.

The move would give the world cruise market a brand-new cruise player, but paradoxically one that would start with a considerable body of experience in the leisure passenger market.

Color Line's first pure cruiseship would be a successor in the ongoing Aker Yards series that began with the 75,000-gt Color Fantasy (built 2004), the world's largest ropax.

The company is also conducting its own internal study on entering the cruiseship market, Color Line information director Helge Otto Mathisen tells TradeWinds. The plans have not previously been announced.

However, Mathisen denies talk that such a ship could serve in a summer co-operation with Norway's coastal ferry or Hurtigruten. He declines to confirm reports that such a ship could enter the market as early as 2009.

"The design agreement has some milestones built into it. But it is too early to say we plan to have a cruiseship in the market in 2009," he said. "It depends on the Aker design study and our own internal evaluations of the cruise market and of our own ability to be a cruiseship operator."

Mathisen tells TradeWinds the company commissioned the design study at the same time as it signed the newbuilding contract with Aker Yards for Color Fantasy's sistership Color Magic (to be delivered September 2007) last May.

TradeWinds has previously reported that Color Line holds an option beyond the second 224-meter long, 35-meter beam, $400m ship in the series, Color Magic, which is set for delivery in 2007. Mathisen says it remains an unconfirmed option.

Color Line is a proven brand in Germany and the new vessel would presumably call there to exploit the company's following as well as the long-standing Teutonic enthusiasm for the fjords of western Norway. A report in German daily Die Welt cites a company source as saying that summer sailings from Germany could involve a co-operation with Norway's Hurtigruten coastal express service whereas winter sailings would seek warmer climes.

Mathisen, however, explains that Color Line co-operates with companies like Hurtigruten and SAS in Germany on marketing Norway as a tourist destination. But a co-operation at the operational level with Hurtigruten would go counter to strategy, which involves taking full responsibility for quality control.

"In all our main markets, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Germany, we want to be more pro-active to take part in development of the tourist market on shore," he told TradeWinds. "We have to be sure that what our guests see and do on shore is the same quality of experience, the same quality of food, the same quality of entertainment as on board."

Mathisen declines to comment on when a decision might be made about entering the cruise market but says the company's firm newbuilding programme still consists of the Color Magic, for delivery in September 2007, and two superspeed vessels for delivery in December 2007 and April 2008.

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