P&S in Scandlines cancellation talks

Mr Brinkmann issued a statement, which says: “I had included the cancellation by Scandlines in my calculations. In recent weeks we had made the two ships, the shipbuilding premises, staff and all construction plans available to Scandlines as well as to other shipbuilders and sub-contractors and in addition we conducted tests ourselves on the ships. Scandlines did not inform us to the scope agreed on about the results of the negotiations with the other shipbuilders.”

The two ferries, Berlin and Copenhagen, are now some nine months and seven months late respectively, and are thought to have incurred substantial penalties for P+S.

Mr Brinkmann continued: “Nonetheless, the commercial offer made by Scandlines is also not acceptable. We presented the offer to the board of creditors this past Thursday. The board of creditors was also not willing to engage in this offer. For this reason we are currently in negotiations with interested parties who are submitting considerably higher bids than Scandlines.”

He went on to say that more positive news for the group is expected this week: “The contracts with the Swedish coastguard for the construction of two coastguard ships at the Peene shipyards were confirmed by the banks yesterday and thus have come into effect. A down payment in the amount of more than €20 million has already been remitted. And we are assuming that several offers for the purchase of the Peene shipyard in Wolgast will be presented to us by the end of the week.”