Meyer urges

European yard

cooperation

The new Chairman of the Committee of EU Shipbuilders Associations (CESA), Bernard Meyer, has urged quality European shipyards to co-operate and stand their ground against Asian competitors.

Meyer, managing partner of the privately-owned Meyer Werft , says ìthe problem is not that I must fight against other good European yards. The problem is that we good European shipyards must stand our ground against Korea, Japan and China.î

Meyer, whose modern facility is among the four most successful cruise ship builders in the world, recently hosted the latest meeting of the European Calypso (Computational Fluid Dynamics in the Ship Design process) research project, which is supported by the European Union.

Calypso covers the collation and sharing of hydrostatic and hydrodynamic ship design data.

The Papenburg meeting was attended by yard delegates from the Netherlands, Denmark, the U.K., Sweden, Finland and Germany. Prominent German, Swedish and Dutch ship research institutes were also represented as were European software houses and the EU.

Meyer said that by sharing their developments, European yards can save a lot of work and avoid surprises. He said each yard had its own experience, but could not do all the work on its own. "If we don't advance and keep our nose ahead in ship design, we have fewer chances of keeping our market share," he warned.

Europe, Meyer recalled, has a share in world shipbuilding of a little over 20%. " It ís a critical share and it must not be allowed to shrink," he said. "I believe it is in the interest of us all that we try to cooperate and maintain our capacities"

A Meyer Werft spokesman added further comment. He told Marine Log that yards in Europe with joint problems should "think European" to combat Asian competition.

That was why Meyer Werft had supported the acquisition of east German yards MTW and Volkswerft by Norway's Aker and Denmark's A.P. Mller Group, he said.