Bihar International has followed through with its long-mooted plans to order new product tankers.
The Dubai-based shipping arm of Saudi Arabia’s AK Albakri & Sons (Bakri Group) has commissioned New Times Shipbuilding of China to construct a series of vessels worth around $340m in total.
Shipbuilding players said Bihar has signed up for two firm 110,000-dwt LR2 tankers for delivery in the second half of 2021. The deal includes options for two more LR2s.
It has also ordered a pair of 50,000-dwt MRs at the shipyard, plus options for two more to be delivered at the end of 2021.
The MRs will be built to IMO 2 and IMO 3 chemical-carrying standards. All of the ships will have scrubbers.
Shipbuilding sources said Bihar is paying between $47m and $48m each for the LR2 tankers, and about $37m apiece for the MRs.
A New Times executive declined to comment, citing contract confidentiality, while Bihar senior executives could not be reached.
Ordering the newbuildings has long been on the cards for Bihar. Last November, its director of marketing and operations, Captain Sukhdip Randhawa, told TradeWinds the company was ready to order, but first wanted to determine whether to go down the scrubber route or use cleaner fuel.
China order resurfaces
The company signed a letter of intent for up to eight tankers at New Times in 2016, but the order was never firmed up.
Bihar is said to have re-opened negotiations with the Chinese yard early this year.
Sources with knowledge of the deal said the yard was chosen because of its strong record with tankers.
“New Times has built 14 MR tankers for Navig8 and it will be constructing up to 18 product tankers for Shell’s Project Solar,” one shipbuilding source said.
“On the LR2 front, it has contracts from some big shipping companies, such as John Fredriksen’s Seatankers and Idan Ofer’s Eastern Pacific Shipping.”
Bihar’s latest New Times move would mark the first tanker order in China placed by the company in almost 12 years. During that period, it has been a prolific buyer of secondhand tonnage.
The company began to dispose of older ships last year as part of its fleet-renewal plan.
Last summer, it sold the South Korean-built, 45,000-dwt MR tanker Forever Rich (built 2000) to Xuanrun Shipping in China for an undisclosed price.
It also scrapped the 47,200-dwt product tanker Aster (built 1996) and 95,600-dwt crude tanker Al Anbariah (built 1993).
According to the company’s website, it owns 26 tankers and 34 offshore units. The tanker fleet consists of one suezmax, 11 aframaxes, four MRs, two LPG carriers, two chemical tankers of about 20,000 dwt and six tankers of less than 7,500 dwt.
