Bharati Shipyard, the second largest private sector shipbuilder in the country, is going slow on fresh orders for building ships since the company is booked to capacity till 2011.
Deal for a large shipyard on the east cost with Apeejay Surendra soon
Satish John & Archana Shukla
MUMBAI: Bharati Shipyard, the second largest private sector shipbuilder in the country, is going slow on fresh orders for building ships since the company is booked to capacity till 2011.
The company, promoted by two former naval architects - P C Kapoor and Vijay Kumar — has seen orders pouring from France, Norway and other leading maritime nations.
“Our orderbook is choc-a-bloc with orders worth Rs 4,000 crore,” Kapoor said in an interview with DNA Money.
“We are going very slow in accepting fresh orders because some orders the deliveries will stretch to 2010 or 2011. We’ll first ensure more capacity being added before we open our order books,” Kapoor said. The company is expanding capacity furiously.
The company will also shortly announce a joint venture with Apeejay Surendra Group for a large shipyard on the east coast. This, however, will be for bigger cargo ships. The four shipyards Bharati owns in Ratnagiri, Goa, Kolkata and Mangalore will continue to build high technology vessels such as offshore vessels.
When quizzed about the impending entry of heavyweights such as Tatas, and Reliance Industries into shipbuilding, Kapoor remains unfazed.
“We have a long history of ship building. We already have delivered more than 300 ships. They will be take time to reach certain standards.”
But Bharati is not resting on its laurels. After acquiring the Swan Hunter shipyard in Europe recently, the company is in the process of dismantling the equipment part by part and moving it to their new shipyard in Mangalore.
This strategy of moving equipment from UK to India has shaved one-third of costs. Setting up a similar infrastructure would have taken a year.
Quizzed on whether the company is eyeing more acquisitions, Kapoor said he would buy today if there are unused shipyards available abroad.
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