OREANDA-NEWS. Vale celebrated today the arrival of the first Valemax, the world's largest iron ore carrier, to the shores of its Teluk Rubiah Maritime Terminal and iron ore distribution center, currently under commissioning in Malaysia. The vessel arrival marks an important milestone as the company looks towards the completion of the distribution hub by the second half of 2014.

The Berge Everest vessel embarked on its maiden voyage to Malaysia loaded with 382,500 tons of iron ore from Brazil and will be unloaded at Teluk Rubiah. The unloaded iron ore in Teluk Rubiah will be stored in the distribution center for future commercial shipments.

With a total investment of USD 1.371 billion, Teluk Rubiah is a cornerstone of Vale's business strategy of investing in high efficiency, integrated production and logistics systems which aim to enhance the company's capabilities of generating customized solutions for its clients in Asia and Southeast Asia.

The facilities are comprised of a deep water jetty and an onshore stockyard of where different types of iron ore can be blended and customized to the needs of regional steelmakers. When completed, the first phase of the Malaysia distribution center will have a capacity of 30 million tons per year of iron ore.

Until February 2014, the Valemax vessels performed 170 unloading operations in 10 different ports around the world on top of our two floating transfer stations in the Phillippines. Vale has already exported about 56 million tons of iron ore through these vessels. Currently, there are 30 Valemax ships (owned and chartered) in operation.