Scandlines is a ferry company that operates the

Rødby Rødby is a town, with a population of 1,983 (1 January 2022),Puttgarden is a ferry harbour and a village on the German island of Fehmarn. It lies on an important route between Germany and Denmark known as the Vogelfluglinie which crosses the strait, the Fehmarnbelt, to Rødby on the island of Lolland. Overview ...

and

Gedser Gedser is a town at the southern tip of the Danish island of Falster in the Guldborgsund Municipality in Sjælland region. It is the southernmost town in Denmark, and also the southernmost point of Scandinavia and the Nordic countries. The town h ...

–

Rostock Rostock (), officially the Hanseatic and University City of Rostock (german: link=no, Hanse- und Universitätsstadt Rostock), is the largest city in the German state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and lies in the Mecklenburgian part of the state, c ...

ferry routes between Denmark and Germany. Scandlines owns 7 ferries, 6 of which are hybrid ferries, making Scandlines the owner of the world's largest fleet of hybrid ferries. In a normal year, Scandlines has over 41,500 departures, 7 million passengers, 1.7 million passenger cars and approx. 700,000 freight units on its two routes. Scandlines has two subsidiaries, Scandlines Danmark ApS and Scandlines Deutschland GmbH, which operate in the two main countries.

History

Scandlines has a long history. In 1903, the first railway ferry sailed between

in Denmark and

Warnemünde (, literally ''Mouth of the Warnow'') is a seaside resort and a district of the city of Rostock in Mecklenburg, Germany. It is located on the Baltic Sea and, as the name implies, at the estuary of the river Warnow. is one of the world's busie ...

in Germany, where De Danske Statsbaner,

DSB DSB may refer to: Science, technology and devices * DsbA, a bacterial member of the Dsb (disulfide bond) family of enzymes * Double strand break, a break in both DNA strands, part of DNA repair * in telecommunications, double-sideband transmission ...

, operated the route from the Danish side in partnership with a state-owned German shipping company. A second service, the 'bird's flight line' (die Vogelfluglinie in German) between

was added in 1963, creating a direct route between

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...

and

Hamburg (male), (female) en, Hamburger(s), Hamburgian(s) , timezone1 = Central (CET) , utc_offset1 = +1 , timezone1_DST = Central (CEST) , utc_offset1_DST = +2 , postal ...

. The company was separated from DSB in 1995, and transformed into an independent limited company called DSB Rederi, which was in turn rebranded Scandlines in 1997. In 1998, the two shipping company partners, Danish Scandlines and German DFO, merged into the company Scandlines, owned by the

Danish Ministry of Transport The Danish Ministry of Transport ( da, Transportministeriet) is the Danish ministry in charge of coordinating and realizing the transport politics of Denmark. The Ministry is headed by a Permanent Secretary. The Ministry of Transport employs a ...

and

Deutsche Bahn The (; abbreviated as DB or DB AG) is the national railway company of Germany. Headquartered in the Bahntower in Berlin, it is a joint-stock company ( AG). The Federal Republic of Germany is its single shareholder. describes itself as the se ...

. Scandlines was privatized in 2007, and sold to the British infrastructure fund 3i, the German investment company Allianz Capital and the shipping company Deutsche Seereederei. Between 1999 and 2015, part of Scandlines' ferry routes were sold, including Aarhus-Kalundborg to

Molslinjen (previously called ) is a Danish company that operates ferry services between Jutland (Jylland) and the island of Zealand (Sjælland). In March 2017, the routes in the Kattegat were renamed to Molslinjen, while the Bornholms services would c ...

, and Helsingør-Helsingborg to

ForSea Ferries ForSea Ferries is a ferry company serving the route between Helsingborg, Sweden and Helsingør, Denmark. Until 2018 the company was called HH-Ferries Group, and the trading name Scandlines was used. The Helsingør–Helsingborg ferry route crosse ...

. Today, Scandlines is owned by a consortium consisting of the three infrastructure funds,

First Sentier Investors First Sentier Investors, formerly known as Colonial First State Global Asset Management in Australia and First State Investments elsewhere, is a global asset management business that manages US$134.4 billion (as at 30 September 2022) in assets ...

, 3i and Federated Hermes. The main focus is on the two routes Gedser-Rostock and Rødby-Puttgarden.

Management

The top management consists of CEO Carsten Nørland, CFO Per Johannesen Madsen and COO Michael Guldmann Petersen. The German part of the organization also has two directors: Heiko Kähler and Gerald Lefold, who are responsible for the day-to-day management of Scandlines' German companies.

Crossings

Scandlines operates two ferry routes between Denmark and Germany.

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Ferries

Scandlines has six hybrid ferries and one freight ferry. In 2022, two ferry had a rotor sail mounted. Scandlines' ferries on Rødby-Puttgarden: Scandlines' ferries on Gedser-Rostock: Freight ferry In November 2021, it was announced that the company has ordered a battery-electric ferry for the Puttgarden-Rødby route from

Cemre Shipyard Cemre may refer to: * In Turkish folklore, three embers sent by a genie fall from the heavens at the end of the winter, and in turn, warm up the air, the water and the earth, one by one. The first cemre falls on the air on/around the 20th of Febru ...

. The new vessel is due to enter service in 2024 and will have two-deck loading alongside a freight capacity of 66 HGVs, or some 1200 lane metres.

Harbours

Scandlines owns the harbours areas in Rødby, Gedser and Puttgarden and rents an area in the harbour of Rostock.

References

External links

* {{Authority control Ferry companies of Denmark Ferry companies of Germany 3i Group companies Companies based in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania Transport companies established in 1998