There's a chess match underway among the heavyweights in the global shipbuilding market and it's clear that Korea's Hyundai Heavy Industries intends to remain the grand master. The world's largest shipbuilder, Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI), is positioning itself to swallow a smaller rival, Korea's Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering. The state-owned Korea Development Bank and a Korean government agency have put up for sale a combined controlling stake of 50.4% in Daewoo. HHI, along with the steel maker Posco, the GS Group and the Hanwha Group have all submitted bids for the stake. Reports suggest that the interest may be worth $8 billion. There would appear to be no better time for the Korean government to sell its interest in Daewoo. The world shipbuilding boom has made HHI flush with cash. It just reported record profits of 6.55 trillion won (about $6.02 billion) for the second quarter ending June 30, 2008. In the first half of this year HHI received $19.8 billion in orders, consisting of 94 ships, marine engines, offshore platforms, and other products, a 62% increase from this point last year. As of June 30, it had an order backlog of 380 ships valued at $42.5 billion.
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