China State Shipbuilding Corp (CSSC), the bigger of the
country's two major ship makers, said its profit almost tripled
last year as it boosted output and improved production
efficiency.
Net income surpassed 14 billion yuan last year, skyrocketing
from 5.2 billion yuan in 2006, the company said yesterday in
Beijing.
It finished 6.55 million deadweight tons of vessels in the past
year and received a record order of more than 23 million dwt of
ships worldwide, which put its overall amount for orders yet to
deliver beyond 50 million dwt.
By occupying the global shipbuilding market of 7.5 percent, 10
percent and another 10 percent in ship construction, new orders and
total orders respectively, CSSC shrank the gap between itself and
the world's largest shipbuilder Hyundai Heavy Industries Co of
South Korea, maintaining the second place for two consecutive
years.
CSSC also plans to sell 65 percent of its shareholding in
Shanghai Jiangnan-Changxing Shipbuilding Co Ltd to its wholly owned
subsidiary Shanghai Waigaoqiao Shipbuilding Co Ltd, according to
its statement to the Shanghai Stock Exchange yesterday.
Invested by CSSC jointly with Baosteel Group, Shanghai
Jiangnan-Changxing Shipbuilding's production base in Changxing
island in Shanghai will be inaugurated on June 3, CSSC said
yesterday.
It may boost CSSC's annual production capacity to 7 million
dwt.
"In the next three years, our output will maintain a high annual
growth rate of 40 percent and in 2010, it will exceed 18 million
dwt," said Chen Xiaojin, chairman and general manager of CSSC. "We
aim to be the biggest shipbuilder by 2015 and make China the top
nation in shipbuilding."
According to Chen, CSSC will also celebrate the launch of
China's first independent tanker for LNG this March, a milestone in
China's shipbuilding history.
Tankers for LNG, or liquefied natural gas, are among the largest
and most complex cargo ships in the world.
"We will continue to put 5 percent of our turnover into research
and development this year to strengthen our independent innovation,
which is the key to long-term development," said Xu Miao, deputy
director of the technology department of CSSC.
Xu said CSSC is also trying to design and develop luxury cruise
liners, which are produced only by European shipbuilders at
present.
(China Daily January 9, 2008)
