TAIWAN's Evergreen Line founder Chang Yung-fa, who for the longest time shunned consortia and shipping alliances as well as mega ships, has died in Taipei. He was 88.

Once the world's largest container carrier, Evergreen Line remains Asia's biggest - at least until the current Cosco-China Shipping merger is complete, which would give the line fifth place in container line rankings.

Dr Chang's success in having Evergreen prosper despite his refusal to join the Far Eastern Freight Conference, banned by the European Union in 2008, proved that a shipping line could survive without the benefit of price-fixing cartels.

Dr Chang said for years that he would rather operate smaller ships that were full than larger ones that had empty cargo space. He also objected to the inflexibility imposed by mega ships as they could only ply a limited number of trade routes.

Economies of scale for the new generation containerships of 12,000 TEU or more can only be properly achieved with load factors close to 100 per cent, he said.

But the reluctance to join the mega ship trend took its toll, leading to decline in market share for the Taiwanese line. Today, Evergreen has 190 ships of 938,931 TEU.

In the end, Evergreen joined the trend to bigger ships and shipping alliances having chartered five 14,000-TEU vessels and ordering eleven 18,000-TEU newbuilds to be delivered in 2018 and 2019.

Evergreen also joined one of the big four global alliances, becoming the largest member of the CKYHE alliance with Cosco, "K" Line, Yang Ming and Hanjin Shipping.

While cultivating the image of the maverick taking on European establishment, he developed a friendship with Margaret Thatcher - she wrote the forward to his memoirs - and Italy's former Prime Minister Romano Prodi.

These led to a UK-flagged fleet and an expansion via the acquisition of Italian carrier Lloyd Triestino, reported Lloyd's List.

As a powerful business figure in Taiwan, and imposing one in his own company, it was perhaps to be expected that the issue of who would be Dr Chang's successor has been a delicate one - with very little visibility from the outside.

Dr Chang was surrounded by a close-knit group of senior executives, although one of this inner circle, first vice-group chairman SS Lin, retired at the end of 2014.

Bronson Hsieh, second vice-chairman of Evergreen, is generally regarded as the most senior in the corporate hierarchy.

Dr Chang served as chairman of Evergreen Group, which owns Asia's largest container fleet through Evergreen Marine Corp; EVA Airways Corp, the island's largest airline by market value; Evergreen Sky Catering Corp, an airline-catering company and hotel chain Evergreen International Hotels.

Dr Chang has a fortune of at least US$1 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.