Austal adds three ferries to Philippines yard orderbook

The 50m high speed catamaran to be built by Austal Philippines for Seaspovill (top) and (below, not to same scale) 30m passenger catamaran design for Supercat Fast Ferry Corporation. Both are Incat Crowther designs

JUNE 19, 2016 — Austal Limited (Austal) (ASX:ASB) has won announce two new contracts worth a total A$30 million (about US$22.3 million) for three commercial passenger ferries. They will be built at the Austal Philippines shipyard in Balamban, Cebu.

The first contract, worth about A$16 million, comes from South Korea’s Seaspovill Co. Ltd and covers construction of a 50 m high speed passenger catamaran that will be built to an Incat Crowther design that has the capacity to carry up to 450 passengers, at speeds of up to 40 knots.

Seaspovill has selected Austal to build the new ship based on continued satisfaction with its 48 m high speed catamaran, Seastar 3, built by Austal in 1998.

The second contract — worth around $A13 million including the provision of spares — comes from Supercat Fast Ferry Corporation (SFFC) of the Philippines, a subsidiary of leading Philippines transportation and logistics company 2Go Group Inc (PSE:2GO). It covers construction of two 30 m passenger catamaran ferries,transporting up to 300 passengers each at up to 25 knots, that are being built to Incat Crowther design.

The two catamarans will join SFFC’s popular Supercat’ fast ferry fleet operating between 10 ports throughout the Philippines Archipelago.Delivery is scheduled for June 2017.

They will be the first vessels built by Austal Philippines for the local market.

Austal CEO David Singleton said the two contracts were significant in many ways, with the two SFFC vessels representing Austal Philippines’ first newbuild program for the Philippines domestic market and the Seaspovill contract Austal’s first newbuild for South Korea.

“Once again Australian ship design and reputation for performance and quality wins out in the highly competitive international shipbuilding market,” he said. “Austal has a world class reputation for high speed ferries and naval vessels which continues to be recognized and brings quality work to the business.”

Since 2013 Austal Philippines has constructed nine ships and collaborated with Austal Australia on a further two ship programs; deliveries have included wind farm vessels, high speed offshore crew transfer vessels and the largest ever vehicle passenger ferry built in the Philippines – the 80 m Aremiti Ferry 2 for SNC Aremiti Ferry of French