Due to stagnant ordering for commercial ship prolonged and boom in offshore energy development, major shipbuilders are focusing on offshore market.
South Korean Big4's offshore order proportion of their entire order intake this year, such as offshore platform, FPSO, drillship, heavy-lifter, shuttle tanker, etc., is about 61% in value terms.
According to shipbuilding industry on March 13, Big4 - Hyundai Heavy Industries, Samsung HI, Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering and STX Offshore & Shipbuilding - have booked a cumulative of about $10.1bn of orders year-to-date, among which about $6.2bn for offshore sector.
Samsung now places in the first place by having secured overall $4.23bn of new order, thanks to high-value three offshore plants, totalling $3.83bn. The Geojae-based yard won a central processing facility, valued at about $2.73bn and two drillships, $1.1bn in total. Order for offshore plant makes up about 90.5% of overall new order and Samsung already achieved 34% of its 2012 order target of $12.5bn.
Daewoo inked $2.2bn (63%) of orders from offshore plant, from a total of $3.5bn new order y-t-d. Around $200m of offshore platform topside, $2bn of ultra-large Ichthys FPSO, etc. It filled up about 32% of overall target of $11bn.
Hyundai has yet to secure order for offshore plant. It only booked $1.4bn of contracts from its Shipbuilding, Offshore & Engineering and Industrial Plant & Engineering divisions, including Hyundai Samho Heavy Industries, which takes 6% of its 2012 new order target $23.6bn. However, the Ulsan-based yard would resume scoring more newbuildings, when offshore vessels and plants are actively ordered.
With a plan to put spurs to sales, STX has won overall $1bn, of which offshore sector took about 20%, including $100m of heavylift crane vessel and mid-$90m shuttle tanker.
Official from STX said, "Recently contracted heavy lifter is state of the art vessel, equipped with various offshore-specialized technology and facilities. We would work hard to win more offshore plant with our high technology."
Market player said, "As order for newbuilding commercial ship is plunging by global economic depression, shipbuilders are turning to offshore plant to stay afloat and make profits. 2012's contracting performance would be decided by orders for offshore plants."