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Devon shipyard’s workforce to increase to more than 300.
Appledore Shipyard is aiming to increase its workforce from 185 to more than 300 over the next two years.
Owners Harland and Wolff told district councillors in Torridge that interest in apprenticeships was growing.
It said it would try to recruit more apprentices and re-train and upskill workers from other industries to boost its workforce.
"We are maxed out with the people we have got," said the company's training manager Tony Cole.
"We have quite a healthy pipeline of work and at the moment we have 185 employees.
"When you consider a few years ago we had 40, that is not bad going.
"By 2025 we need to be up to the 300-350 mark."
Bosses were speaking at a meeting of Torridge District Council's overview and scrutiny committee.
The Company remains of the firm belief that any appeal will hold no merit
given that the judicial review judgement comprehensively rejected the
applicant's claims on all five grounds. In the meantime, the appeals process
will not impede or obstruct ongoing conversations being held with several
counterparties in relation to the most optimum pathway to monetise the project
and the Company continues to make progress as planned.
"One of our more recent investments has been Gooch & Housego (LSE: GHH), a leading manufacturer of photonics and electro-optics solutions selling to a blue-chip client base of healthcare, industrial and aerospace customers around the globe. The group’s end markets are growing strongly, and G&H is well-placed with unique capabilities in optical coatings and materials. Having historically been built up through mergers and acquisitions, the group recently appointed a new CEO, who is focusing on boosting margins significantly by integrating historic deals better. Today the stock is on an enterprise-value/sales (EV/sales) ratio of around one, compared with a ten-year average of 2.2. We feel the market is giving little credit to the growth and improvement potential in a group with world-leading intellectual property (IP)." Odyssean Investment Trust 12/10/23
View from Vox
Harland & Wolff’s strategic shift to establish its own marine operations division represents a substantial opportunity for cost savings and operational efficiency, further supported by the growing demand for maritime operations.
Aside from today's update, other recent highlights from Harland include a significant project involving the mid-life upgrade and dry docking of a large vessel with expected revenues ranging from £60-70 million. Harland also secured its first contract win for a heavy lift vessel in Belfast, amounting to £1.5 million.
Financially, Harland noted its H1 revenues stood at £25.53 million, a 65% increase from the previous year’s £15.41 million. Looking ahead, directors believe that trading remains on track to achieve FY23 revenues of £100 million, with revenue guidance for FY24 of £200 million.
Overall, Harland has shown impressive momentum in 2023, with the FSS contract providing substantial baseload over the next five years. Coupled with significant opportunities maritime operations, the maritime engineer is in a good position to continue along its strong trajectory.
More details of the construction strategy have become public. Navantia will build more than half of the first vessel in Cadiz including the more complex after sections which will then be shipped by barge for assembly in Belfast. It is possible a larger percentage of ships 2 and 3 will be constructed in Northern Ireland. Appledore shipyard in Devon will construct the bow sections, although not in a single piece. As part of a £77M investment in facilities for FSS, before first steel is cut in 2025, H&W have just begun civil works to improve the Belfast yard. This includes a 5,000m2 extension to the existing fabrication halls and an automated line able to handle 16m2 panels.
Those close to the project say they have “full confidence in the prime”, even if there were production issues at Belfast, Navantia could take on more work in Spain. However, the contract is structured to incentivise maximum UK supply chain involvement. The controversies around the overseas work share may continue but the pathway is set and the navy needs these ships as soon as possible. Those with genuine concern for UK shipbuilding would now do better to focus their efforts on doing everything possible to help support Harland & Wolff in delivering the contract on time. Having mobilised the skills and revived a third naval shipbuilding facility in the UK, ensuring the Multi-Role Support Ship project is fully funded and work flows on smoothly from FSS is the next big challenge for the industry.
DESA has two former Royal Navy minehunters to sell in the form of HMS PENZANCE and HMS BANGOR.
HMS Blyth was transferred to the Romanian Navy this month, while HMS Pembroke will be transferred next spring.
In the context of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, drifting mines pose a direct threat to Black Sea states, and sea lines of communication. This sale will enable Romania, a key NATO ally, to have a direct, positive contribution to the maritime security of the region.
It follows other minehunter sales made by DESA, including HMS QUORN, DULVERTON and COTTESMORE to Lithuania, HMS SANDOWN, INVERNESS and BRIDPORT to Estonia, HMS BERKELEY and BICESTER to Greece, and HMS ATHERSTONE to maritime contractor Harland & Wolff.
The outgoing Sandown Class will be replaced by autonomous mine-hunting systems operating from RFA Stirling Castle, the new “mothership” bought by DE&S as a commercial vessel from Norwegian company Island Offshore before being modified for her future role.
Happy to be invested here obviously in for the long haul and to support the reappeared green shoots in British shipbuilders.
Commons Leader Penny Mordaunt, an Honorary Commander in the Royal Naval Reserve, has had an "amazing" visit to Belfast as work begins on a multimillion-pound shipbuilding contract.
The Fleet Solid Support (FSS) contract with Royal Fleet Auxiliary unlocked £77m of investment for Belfast-based Harland & Wolff to build three 40,000-tonne vessels which will supply the Royal Navy fleet and Nato allies at sea.
MP Ms Mordaunt visited Harland & Wolff, which is home to one of the largest deep-water dockyards in Europe, as upgrades to the shipyard got underway to facilitate the new contract, which she said was "brilliant news for the whole of the UK".To mark the beginning of the work she met some of the apprentices who are due to work on the project.
Ms Mordaunt said she had been discussing the expansion work at Harland & Wolff.
"It's been fantastic to visit this incredibly important yard, which is really helping us bring shipbuilding back to the UK and enable us to expand that sector," she said.
"We've been discussing expanding the square footage of this yard and we've cut the turf today on that, but it's also about expanding jobs - 1,200 jobs here, 800 across the whole of the UK - but also knowledge, and this really unique project for the fleet support ships is doing that.
"It's building capacity here and we're getting knowledge transfer from our partners.
"So it's been an amazing, amazing visit."The upgrade of the Belfast shipyard to adopt state-of-the-art shipbuilding techniques will look to underpin Harland & Wolff's capacity to deliver key naval programmes of FSS and beyond.
At the peak of the FSS contract, Harland & Wolff is expected to employ 1,200 personnel across its Belfast and Appledore shipyards, with an expected additional 800+ across the UK supply chain.
John Wood, Harland & Wolff's chief executive, said the work would continue Belfast's legacy of shipbuilding.
"It gives me great pleasure to see shovels in the ground as improvement works begin at our Belfast site," he said.
"Belfast has a long shipbuilding history, and our latest investments will enable the site to continue designing, building and maintaining technologically cutting-edge vessels for years to come."Defence Secretary Grant Shapps said the work that had now begun was a "hugely significant step" in the FSS programme.
"Supporting hundreds of skilled jobs in Northern Ireland, the expansion of this historic site hails the beginning of shipbuilding's valiant return to Belfast, driving prosperity right across the Union," he said.
All three support ships are expected to be operational by 2032.
Taken from forces.net 22nd September 2023.
Taken from UK Defence Journal recently
Scotland stands poised on the precipice of a new golden era for its naval shipbuilding industry.
Scotland’s naval shipbuilding industry is witnessing a renaissance, a boom that promises consistent growth well into the 2040s.
Shipyard workers in the heart of Glasgow, Rosyth and Port Glasgow are busier than they have been in decades, fabricating steel and constructing some of the Royal Navy’s most advanced warships.
A sector once marred by periods of ‘feast and famine’ is now witnessing a resurgence, with its shipyards humming with activity and its workforce expanding.
Gooch & Housego Plc is a photonics technology business, which researches, designs, engineers, and manufactures advanced photonic systems, components and instrumentation for applications in the Aerospace and Defence, Industrial, Life Sciences, and Scientific Research sectors. It operates through the following segments: Aerospace and Defence, Life Sciences/Bio-photonics, Industrial, and Corporate. The company was founded by Archibald William Charles Gooch and Leslie Housego in 1948 and is headquartered in Ilminster, the United Kingdom.
One of the best kept secrets of AIM in my humble opinion l.
BAE Systems has lifted its annual profit forecast as the war in Ukraine helped drive orders to a new record at Britain’s biggest defence company.
The company said on Wednesday that it had won £21.1bn of new orders in the first six months of the year, as governments stepped up their military spending. Its order backlog hit a record £66.2bn.
This will be reflected in the defence and aerospace arm of GHH in the future too.
Especially love this part of the update by Charlie about the new product opportunities exciting times ahead and paying a dividend too,
Chief executive Charlie Peppiatt said: "Positive progress has been made in the first half with increasing operational output and continued strong levels of customer engagement on new product opportunities. Full year expectations for the Group are unchanged and the outcome of our strategy review confirms a clear route to mid-teens returns in the medium term."
Peel Hunt Limited set a target price of 750 GBX for the company, which when compared to the Gooch & Housego, share price of 571 GBX at opening today (07/06/2023) indicates a potential upside of 31.5%. Trading has ranged between 388 (52 week low) and 964 (52 week high) with an average of 30,525 shares exchanging hands daily. The market capitalisation at the time of writing is £142,446,689.