STS Container Crane Suppliers in Morocco (2026)

If you build ship-to-shore container cranes and want to sell into Morocco, there are three buyers worth your time: Tanger Med, APM Terminals, and Marsa Maroc. Tanger Med handled more than 10 million TEU in 2024, up 18.8% year-on-year, and the next wave of STS demand is already specified at Nador West Med.

Why Morocco is buying STS cranes right now

Morocco is the buyer, not the maker. The country imports every ship-to-shore crane it operates, and the order pipeline through 2030 is unusually clear because it is tied to named terminal expansions rather than speculative demand.

Start with the headline number. Tanger Med crossed 10 million TEU in 2024 and is now the busiest container port in the Mediterranean and on the African continent. That volume sits on top of two expansion programmes that each pull in quay cranes. APM Terminals finished a 2 million TEU expansion at its MedPort Tangier (TM2) terminal in December 2024, lifting capacity to 5.2 million TEU and adding four new STS cranes that took its fleet from 20 to 24 units. A separate USD 500 million truck-terminal expansion, backed by an IFC loan, runs alongside it.

Then there is the greenfield. The West Container Terminal at Nador West Med, the country’s new deep-water port on the Mediterranean, will be fitted with eight ship-to-shore gantry cranes across 900 metres of quay at 18 metres draft, coming into service from 2027 with an annual capacity target of 1.8 million TEU. Marsa Maroc holds 51% of the operating joint venture and CMA Terminals 49%. Eight STS cranes is a single large order, and the specification is current.

Add it up and Morocco is one of the few African markets where the STS order book is visible, named, and dated rather than aspirational. The wider context sits in the Morocco light manufacturing and port equipment guide, which maps the full quay-and-yard equipment basket. This page goes deep on the single most expensive line in that basket: the ship-to-shore crane.

What the buyers actually specify

Moroccan terminal operators buy at the top of the global spec curve, which is good news for established crane makers and a high bar for newcomers.

The APM Terminals MedPort Tangier fleet is built around super post-Panamax double-trolley cranes with 72 to 82 metres of outreach, able to work vessels 24 to 26 containers wide. The newest four units carry 82-metre outreach and remote-control operation. A further eight cranes for a later phase were ordered at around EUR 117 million, which is a useful real-world anchor for what a large STS package costs in this market.

For a supplier, the practical read is this. The reference specification is automation-ready, remote-controllable, super post-Panamax cranes sized for the largest vessels calling the western Mediterranean. Electrification is the default, not the upgrade: Morocco’s terminals are moving to electric yard fleets, and quay-crane procurement follows the same energy logic. If your STS range tops out below 24-wide vessel coverage, you are competing for the smaller commercial-port and bulk-adjacent orders rather than the flagship container berths.

This puts Moroccan demand squarely in the same heavy-lifting family that European port-crane makers already serve. Suppliers who sell maritime and ship-to-shore cranes into export markets, for example the German crane manufacturers covered in our export guide, are quoting the same product class into Tanger Med and Nador West Med that they quote into Hamburg or Rotterdam.

Who issues the RFQs

The buyer set for STS cranes in Morocco is small and findable. You do not need a long prospect list. You need to qualify into four or five organisations.

APM Terminals (the Maersk arm) runs MedPort Tangier (TM2) and buys its quay-crane fleet directly through its global engineering and procurement function. It is a sophisticated, English-language, internationally governed buyer.

Marsa Maroc, the listed Moroccan terminal operator, runs the East Container Terminal at Nador West Med and now holds the majority stake in the West Terminal joint venture. It is the principal behind the eight new STS cranes specified for that terminal.

Tanger Med Port Authority (TMPA) is the landlord-operator of the Tanger Med complex and the procurement principal for common-user infrastructure across the port.

The Agence Nationale des Ports (ANP) governs Casablanca, Agadir, and the other commercial ports outside the Tanger Med and Nador West Med perimeters. ANP-side handling-equipment tenders run through the national public-procurement portal at marchespublics.gov.ma, in French and Arabic, so a French executive summary is the minimum entry ticket.

The split matters for how you sell. The global operators (APM Terminals, Marsa Maroc with CMA Terminals) qualify suppliers directly and run their crane procurement in English through corporate engineering teams. The public-port side runs through the state portal in French. A supplier who treats both channels the same way loses one of them.

How an STS crane deal gets paid

Payment on a quay-crane order in Morocco looks like European port procurement with a managed-currency wrapper, and the friction is lower than most of the continent.

Currency. Quote in EUR for European-built cranes. The dirham trades on a managed band against a basket weighted roughly 60% EUR and 40% USD, so EUR pricing maps cleanly onto how Moroccan buyers cost the purchase, and the peg is predictable. The large operators with global treasuries accept USD.

Letters of credit. A single STS crane runs into the millions of EUR and a fleet order into the tens of millions, so settlement is structured. Expect confirmed letters of credit issued through Attijariwafa Bank, Banque Centrale Populaire, or Bank of Africa and confirmed by a European bank. A typical capex shape is a 20% to 30% advance against bank guarantee, the bulk on shipping and inspection documents, and the balance on commissioning and crane acceptance testing, with performance and retention bonds of 5% to 10%.

Export-credit cover. Big crane orders frequently ride on export-credit-agency cover. Euler Hermes, Cesce, SACE, Coface, SERV, and Sinosure all hold active Morocco country limits, and the country’s risk band supports medium-term buyer-credit structures, which is what makes an eight-crane order financeable. The development-finance presence on the Tanger Med truck terminal (IFC, MIGA) shows how DFIs sit alongside commercial banks on the headline port packages.

For the full FX, letters-of-credit, and procurement-maturity picture across every Moroccan sector, the Morocco industrial and procurement guide is the country pillar to read first.

Dying conventional channels for port cranes in Morocco

The old routes into Moroccan port buyers still exist. The returns on them have thinned to the point where they no longer carry a sales plan on their own.

Trade fairs. Logismed in Casablanca and the major European port shows (TOC Europe, the global TOC events where Moroccan operators send delegations) still deliver face time. A stand plus travel for a crane maker runs into the high tens of thousands of EUR, and the yield is a handful of warm conversations. At a blended USD 300 to USD 900-plus per qualified lead, fairs now work as relationship maintenance, not primary lead generation, especially for a product with a buyer set you could write on one hand.

Local agents and distributor lock-in. STS cranes do not move through distribution. The global terminal operators buy directly from OEMs, which strands any supplier who defaults to appointing a Moroccan agent and surrenders margin for access the operators do not actually route through.

Field representatives. A Casablanca-based technical-sales rep costs EUR 100,000 to 180,000 fully loaded and realistically covers one or two equipment lines. At USD 500 to USD 1,200-plus per qualified lead, the field-rep model only pays back above several million EUR of annual Morocco revenue, which a crane maker may hit on a single order but cannot rely on year to year.

Generic email blasts. Scraped-list blasting burns sender reputation with the operators and their banks, and recovery is slow. Named, researched, persona-level outreach to the engineering and procurement leads at the four or five buyers performs far better than volume ever will.

How papaverAI fits a buyer set this small

When the entire addressable buyer list for a product is four or five named organisations, broad advertising is the wrong tool. Research-grade outbound is the right one.

An AI-driven outbound engine targets the specific procurement and engineering personas at APM Terminals, Marsa Maroc, TMPA, and the ANP, in the right language for each, timed to when a terminal expansion or a new crane phase is announced. The economics favour it for a market this concentrated. papaverAI runs at roughly USD 150 to USD 300 per qualified lead and the cost falls as the engine learns the buyer set, while trade fairs hold at USD 300 to USD 900-plus and field reps at USD 500 to USD 1,200-plus, both scaling linearly at best. To see how the engine is configured for buyer-side targeting, read how it works.

Frequently asked questions

Who buys ship-to-shore container cranes in Morocco?

The container-terminal operators buy STS cranes directly. APM Terminals operates MedPort Tangier and Marsa Maroc, with CMA Terminals, runs the Nador West Med terminals. Tanger Med Port Authority procures common-user infrastructure, and the Agence Nationale des Ports handles equipment at Casablanca and the other public ports.

How many STS cranes is Morocco buying in the next few years?

Nador West Med’s West Container Terminal alone will be fitted with eight ship-to-shore gantry cranes, coming into service from 2027. APM Terminals MedPort Tangier added four STS cranes in its 2024 expansion, taking its fleet to 24, and has a further eight-crane phase specified.

What specification do Moroccan terminals require for STS cranes?

The reference specification is super post-Panamax, remote-control-ready cranes with 72 to 82 metres of outreach, able to work vessels 24 to 26 containers wide. Electrification is the default. Suppliers below that vessel-coverage band compete for commercial-port and bulk berths rather than the flagship container terminals.

What currency and payment terms apply to a crane order in Morocco?

Quote in EUR for European-built cranes, since the dirham basket is weighted about 60% EUR, though large operators accept USD. Settlement runs through confirmed letters of credit at Attijariwafa Bank, BCP, or Bank of Africa, typically with a 20% to 30% advance and the balance on commissioning, often under export-credit-agency cover.

Where to go next

If you build ship-to-shore cranes, the Moroccan buyer set is small enough to approach directly, and the named operators above are your qualification targets. For the broader quay-and-yard equipment basket, see the Morocco light manufacturing and port equipment guide, and for the full picture of how foreign suppliers win RFQs across the country, start at the Morocco industrial and procurement guide. To put a specific crane opportunity in front of the right buyer, send your spec, drawings, outreach, and lift rating and we will route it: start a conversation or reach Burak directly at burak@papaverai.com.