Shipping forecast

Shipping forecast

BY RICHARD SCOTT

South Korea’s Hyundai Heavy Industries (Stand B-036) comes to NAVDEX 2019 poised to buy its local rival Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering (DSME).

Last month, HHI and the Korea Development Bank (KDB) – which owns a 55.7 per cent stake in DSME – signed a preliminary agreement for the takeover. KDB confirmed the deal on 12 February after another South Korean shipyard, Samsung Heavy Industries, said it would not enter the bidding for DSME.

KDB has agreed to transfer its entire shareholding in DSME to the new joint venture in exchange for a 7 per cent stake in the new company. “The agreement between Hyundai Heavy Industries Group and Korea Development Bank is a solution for the recovery of the domestic shipbuilding industry,” said HHI in a statement. A definitive sales agreement is expected to be signed in early March.

Commercial shipbuilding represents the bedrock for HHI and DSME, with the two yards having more than 50 per cent of existing worldwide orders for liquefied natural gas (LNG) carriers between them. However, the two companies – based in Ulsan and Okpo respectively – have in recent years also emerged as major players in the naval sector. Both are involved in new construction for the Republic of Korea Navy (RoKN), including the build of KDX-III Batch 2 destroyers (HHI is under contract for the first of class), FFX-II frigates (production being split between the two yards) and KSS-III submarines (the first two being built by DSME, the third by HHI).

DSME was in late 2018 contracted by South Korea’s Defense Acquisition Program Administration to build the new ASR-II submarine rescue ship for the RoKN.

The two companies have also secured significant export business in the naval sector over recent years. DSME last year delivered RFA Tideforce, the last of four new Tide-class replenishment tankers for the UK Royal Fleet Auxiliary, the logistic support vessel KNM Maud to Norway, and the frigate HTMS Tachin to the Royal Thai Navy.

Meanwhile, HHI is building two frigates for the Philippines Navy under a contract signed in October 2016, with delivery scheduled for 2020 and 2021 respectively. HHI is also building a new ice-capable replenishment ship, to be named HMNZS Aotearoa, for the Royal New Zealand Navy.

Floating decoy seducts, distracts and confuses

With regional navies becoming ever more conscious of the antiship missile threat, IrvinGQ (Stand 05-C02) is pressing the merits of its FDS3 corner reflector decoy system at IDEX.

Originally developed by IrvinGQ for the UK Royal Navy (RN), where it entered service in 2006 under the designation Outfit DLF(3b), the FDS3 system deploys an inflatable, fast-erecting corner reflector decoy that can be used to counter anti-ship missile RF seekers in seduction, distraction and confusion modes. Following the lead of the RN, the US Navy, the Royal Canadian Navy and the Royal New Zealand Navy have all subsequently purchased the FDS3 decoy. According to IrvinGQ, the FDS-3 offers a number of advantages compared with chaff decoys. These include a large and ship-like radar cross-section with consistent and enduring performance, no requirement for prior threat knowledge, and no interference with own-ship sensors. Most importantly, says the company, the decoy can defeat the chaff discrimination logic employed by many modern missile seekers.

FDS3 units are supplied as a complete decoy launch tube assembly, typically in pairs, and may be standalone or integrated within the ship’s systems. In the event ship’s power is lost, the FDS3 can still be launched mechanically.