The most famous Portuguese Shipping Company, the Companhia Colonial de Navegação (in English Colonial Navigation Company) was founded in 1922, in Angola, then a Portuguese Colony, to provoke rivalry with the Companhia Nacional de Navegação (CNN), which lost the monopoly of the routes with the Portuguese African Colonies as soon the company was founded. 

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From 1922 until 1947 all their ships were bought. They operated mostly ex-German liners lost by Germany during the First World War, two of those were the ex-HAPAG Ypiranga and Corcovado, which became, respectively, the N.T. Colonial (1929) and the N.T. Mouzinho (1931), which reunited the sisters. In 1940, they bought the N.T. Serpa Pinto, which was originally built for the Royal Mail in 1914. During the Second World War, in 1944, the ship was stopped and boarded by the German Submarine U-541 crew and almost sunk her, of which all the passengers were already in lifeboat, but the German High Command order not to sink her, but tragically 3 passengers died during all of this.

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Only in 1947, all thanks to the Despacho 100, they built their first ships, the sisterships N.T. Pátria and N.T. Império, which were launch almost at the same time as Cunard-White Star R.M.S. Caronia (1947). It was only in the 1950’s they received the beloved N.T. Vera Cruz (1952) and the N.T. Santa Maria (1953). In 1961, an event which is best known as the Santa Maria Highjack, in which rebels from Portugal and Spain highjack the ship against the dictatorships of Salazar and Franco and re-baptize as the Santa Liberdade. Months later, the Portuguese Colonial War (1961 – 1974) started in Angola and many ships took soldiers to the front lines.  In 1961 the company received their last ship, the N.T. Infante Dom Henrique.

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The company merged with Empresa Insulina de Navegação (EIN) to form Companhia Portuguesa de Transportes Marítimos (CPTM) in February 1974, which ceased operations in 1985, alongside CNN. Infante was the last ship to be retired, serving up until 2003.