Hyundai wins massive LNG order

Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) has won an order to build eight LNG carriers for BP Shipping of the United Kingdom. The gas carriers will be in the 155,000 cubic meter class and will cost a total of $1.5 billion. Hyundai Samho Heavy Industries, formerly Halla Heavy Industries and now a subsidiary of HHI, will build three of the ships.

With this order, HHI is approaching the order level of its two main competitors, i.e. Samsung Heavy Industries and Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering, which this year received orders for 11 and 13 LNG carriers respectively.

Out of 16 LNG carriers that were ordered last year internationally, 13 are being built in South Korean yards while, so far this year, out of the 40 carriers that have been ordered, 35 are being built in Korea.

Another Korean shipbuilder, STX Shipbuilding, won an order to build four 47,000DWT product carriers from Sovcomflot in Russia at a total price of $170 million for delivery during 2007.