Silja Line
| Subsidiary | |
| Industry | Shipping |
| Founded | 1957 |
| Headquarters | Helsinki, Finland |
|
Area served
|
Northern Europe |
|
Key people
|
Margus Schults |
| Products | Ferries, port services, passenger transportation, freight transportation, holidays, business travel |
| Parent | AS Tallink Grupp |
| Website | www.tallinksilja.com |
Silja Line is a Finnish cruiseferry brand operated by the Estonian ferry company AS Tallink Grupp, for car and passenger traffic between Finland and Sweden.
The former company Silja Oy—today Tallink Silja Oy—is a subsidiary of the Tallink Grupp, handling marketing and sales for Tallink and Silja Line brands in Finland as well as managing Tallink Silja's ship employees. Another subsidiary, Tallink Silja AB, handles marketing and sales in Sweden. Strategical corporate management is performed by Tallink Grupp which also own the ships.
As of 2009 four ships service two routes under the Silja Line brand, transporting about three million passengers and 200,000 cars every year. The Silja Line ships have a market share of around 50 percent on the two routes served.
The history of Silja Line can be traced back to 1904 when two Finnish shipping companies, Finland Steamship Company (Finska Ångfartygs Aktiebolaget, FÅA for short) and Steamship Company Bore, started collaborating on Finland–Sweden traffic. The initial collaboration agreement was terminated in 1909, but re-established in 1910. After World War I in 1918 a new agreement was made that also included the Swedish Rederi AB Svea. Originally the collaboration agreement applied only on service between Turku and Stockholm, but was also applied to the Helsinki–Stockholm in 1928. As a precursor to the policies later adopted by Silja Line, each of the three companies ordered a near-identical ship for Helsinki–Stockholm service to coincide with the 1952 Summer Olympics, held in Helsinki. Eventually only Finland SS Co.'s SS Aallotar was ready in time for the olympics. At this time the city of Helsinki constructed the Olympia Terminal in Helsinki's South Harbour, that Silja Line's ships still use.
Realising that car-passenger ferries would be the dominating traffic form in the future, the three collaborating companies decided to form a daughter company, Oy Siljavarustamo / Siljarederiet Ab. The new company started out with used ships which were not particularly well-fitted for the role they were meant for, but that changed when in 1961 Silja took delivery of the new MS Skandia, the first purpose-built car-passenger ferry in the northern Baltic Sea. Skandia's sister MS Nordia followed the next year and the era's giant MS Fennia in 1966. Two more ships based on the Skandia design, MS Botnia and MS Floria were delivered in 1967 and 1970, respectively.
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Wikipedia