Turkey’s increasing role in specialised newbuilding projects as tanker deals have dwindled was highlighted this week with an order at Tersan Shipyard.
The yard at Yalova, in the north-west of the country, announced it had signed a contract to build the hull of a 120-metre krill trawler worth more than NOK 1bn ($113m) for Norwegian fish processing company Rimfrost.
The rest of the high-tech vessel will be built by Norway’s Westcon Yards and other outfits from the Norwegian maritime cluster at Sunnmore. The ship is to be delivered in 2022.
Biggest client breakdown by country: Norway 39 projects, Azerbaijan 13, Turkey 11, Malta six and Germany five
Vessels built to date: 27 fishing vessels, five offshore ships, five tug boats, two general cargo vessels, 25 chemical/oil tankers, 15 passengerships and three floating docks
Orderbook to the end of 2021: 11 fishing vessels, three passenger vessels, one AHTS and one reefer cargo vessel
Last tanker delivered: The 5,700-dwt Nabucco (built 2016) for Germany’s GEFO
Source: Tersan, TradeWinds
About half of the order value will go to Norwegian enterprises, Rimfrost said. That suggests the contract is worth at least $50m at Tersan’s end of the deal.Tersan declined to discuss the financial details of the agreement.
Irrespective of its monetary value, the agreement is a landmark for the yard. In combination with an order for Ervik Havfiske, another Norwegian fishing company, it boosts to 100 the number of projects Tersan has won since entering the newbuilding business in 2001.
“She will be one of the most sophisticated projects in our orderbook,” Tersan marketing director Sakir Erdogan said.
Tersan’s first projects were small chemical tankers. However, like other Turkish yards, it has shifted its focus to markets such as fishing boats and passengerships.
It is the first vessel Tersan will build for Rimfrost, and Erdogan hopes it is the start of a long-term business relationship.
Tersan is already familiar with Norwegian clients, which account for about 40% of its business.
The more Tersan concentrates on specialised projects, the more important its Norwegian clients become. Most of the nine ships in its current orderbook are being built for Norwegian owners, according to the company website.
Tersan has carved out this niche as it has struggled to compete on price with Far Eastern rivals for traditional, mass-production tankers and bulkers.
However, when it comes to specialised, boutique ships, it is enjoying a cost advantage over its rivals in Western Europe, and other Turkish yards have followed suit.
Sefine Shipyard is building ferries, live-fish carriers and other tonnage. In October 2018, it delivered the first LNG-fuelled ferry in the Mediterranean — the 8,800-gt Elio (built 2018) — ordered by Italy’s Caronte & Tourist.
The Besiktas shipyard group has focused on shiprepairs, rising to become Europe’s busiest yards for such business in 2018, according to Clarksons.
Much of this business goes to Norwegians. According to data by the Turkish Exporters Assembly, ship and yacht sales to Norway doubled to $370m last year, accounting for one-third of the total.
Tersan, which is also active in repairs, is one of Turkey’s biggest exporters. Several of its recently completed newbuildings are LNG-propelled fishing vessels and battery-powered passengerships.
Cooperation on high-tech shipping projects may help the company rise even higher along the value chain. In addition to being built to satisfy the IMO’s strict environmental Polar Code, Rimfrost claims its new ship will revolutionise krill fishing in Antarctica.
Designed by Kongsberg Maritime, “this will be the only vessel in the world where health food and food supplements [made from krill oil] are actually produced at sea immediately after catching”, according to Rimfrost principal shareholder Stig Remoy.
Rimfrost said it can therefore catch less krill to obtain the same amount of finished product.
