Marketing Strategy for Merchant Shipbuilders

Much has been published over the years about technology and productivity in shipbuilding, and much also about the shipbuilding market and its potential. Little has been published to date, however, about the all important techno-economic interface between the two. This paper sets out to explore this interface and to identify how a shipyard can be matched to its external environment through the adoption of a coherent strategy. The elements of external forces are considered (in particular, prices and market volume), and the internal factors within the control of a shipyard are examined to review how they can be utilized in a strategic sense to match a shipyard to a targeted market sector. The elements reviewed include prices, exchange rates, physical constraints, capacity, market volume, production characteristics, and shipyard organization.