P&O Ferries is a British shipping company that operates ferries from United Kingdom to Ireland, and to Continental Europe (France and the Netherlands). The company was created in 2002 through mergers and acquisitions within P&O. It has been owned by Dubai-based DP World since 2019. History 1960s – 1989 P&O originally established ferry services in the United Kingdom in the late 1960s in the North Sea and the English Channel. In the late 1970s P&O was affected by a reduction in traditional shipping activities which saw the sale of a number of its businesses and assets. This continued into 1985 with the sale of its cross-channel ferry activities to European Ferries, which at the time consisted of services on the Dover–Boulogne and Southampton–Le Havre routes. In January the following year, P&O purchased a 50.01% interest in European Financial Holdings Ltd, which held 20.8% of shares in European Ferries, followed in 1987 with the purchase of the remaining shares of the European Ferries Group whose ferry services were trading as Townsend Thoresen. Following the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster in March 1987, the operations of Townsend Thoresen were renamed P&O European Ferries on 22 October 1987, with operations from Portsmouth, Felixstowe and Dover. 1990 – 2019 Following a consultation with the Competition Commission beginning 28 November 1996, P&O European Ferries split into three separate subsidiaries: P&O Portsmouth, P&O North Sea and the creation of a joint venture between P&O and the Swedish ferry company Stena Line's UK subsidiary Stena Line (UK) Ltd to create P&O Stena Line in Dover. In April 2002, P&O announced its intention to purchase Stena Line's 40% share of the joint venture. The purchase was completed by August, and in October 2002 the Portsmouth and North Sea operations were merged with the Dover operations to create P&O Ferries Ltd, jointly managing all services from its head office, Channel House in Dover. In September 2004, P&O Ferries Ltd conducted a business review that concluded with the announcement of closure of several of its long-term Portsmouth-based routes, leaving only the Portsmouth – Bilbao route in operation. These closures were predominantly blamed on the expansion of low-cost airlines and the increasing usage of the Channel Tunnel as a faster alternative to ferry operations. In 2006, the P&O Group, including P&O Ferries was sold to Dubai-based DP World. Shortly afterwards it was taken over by Dubai World. On 15 January 2010,