By the one-hundredth anniversary of the People’s Republic in 2049, China hopes to have completed the world's first seamless transcontinental cargo transportation network. Commonly referred to as the ‘new Silk Road’, after the famous medieval caravan route, road, rail, and sea routes will join together to ship freight and vehicles between Chinese manufacturers and markets in Europe, and vice versa.

As the automotive industry makes the great shift to electric vehicles - or so the meteoric rise of Tesla and NIO in 2020 would have us believe - logistics businesses are finding themselves with a transportation headache. Traditional RoRo shipping simply doesn’t work for these vehicles, but why? And will it ever change?

Traditional wooden racking systems did little to improve the PR of containerised vehicle transport, due to their high instances of collapse and damage to vehicles in transit.

An unsecured car in a shipping container risks being thrown about like a glass jar inside a shoebox, with similarly damaging results. This is why it is so important to use efficient, robust, and secure car racking when transporting your vehicles by shipping container.

Indonesia is a hub for car transportation in East Asia, with many cars being shipped into Tanjung Priok port in North Jakarta, and from there to Asia, Australia, The Americas, and other locations. The shipping lines throughout Indonesia – the largest island archipelago in the world containing over 14,000 islands– are also busy with car shipments going from island to island, especially the population centres of Sumatra, Java, and Kalimantan.

Container shipping transport for cars is – in principle at least – as convenient for shipping vehicles around the world as it is for iPads, building supplies, and flat-pack furniture. Once driven into the container and secured, nothing else needs to be done until the disembarkation point. The sticking point is the cost of containerised car transport. With only a couple of vehicles fitting in each container, the cost of transport soon mounts up, making Ro-Ro a better option, despite the risks.

The Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) is a large economic bloc comprising 10 member states in Southeast Asia. The members – which include Thailand, Vietnam, Singapore, the Philippines, Myanmar, Malaysia, Indonesia, Laos, Brunei, and Cambodia – all have in common a shared coastline in the South Pacific or South China Sea. The shipping lanes that run between the thousands of small islands in the bloc are strongly dominated by container ships, and the ASEAN region encompasses some of the most important trade routes in the world for international car transportation.

Consumers are becoming increasingly concerned about the carbon footprints of their supply chains. This is a challenge for car manufacturers and sellers, as vehicle manufacturing is a truly global enterprise. Shipping is one of the biggest global contributors to CO² and NO² emissions. Is there a way of transporting a fleet of cars responsibly?

Increasing numbers of companies, private suppliers, and motorsport owners are rejecting antiquated roll-on-roll-off ferries for faster, safer, and more efficient containerised solutions. Times are definitely changing! Here are five of the ways that car racking systems have revolutionised the industry, and how you can benefit.

Whether trying to save a precious vehicle or shipping parts, damaged cars are important cargo. Here’s what you need to know!