Innovative boat building in Chonburi, Thailand

• Project location: Sattahip, Thailand 
• Consortium: BV Scheepswerf en Machinefabriek v/h A. van de Grijp, Global Boat Builders Co. Ltd., Yacht Dimension Thailand Co. Ltd. 
• Project budget: Euro 1.0 million
• External financing: 50% grant funding by PSOM
• Project period: July 2008 - June 2010

Abstract

BV Scheepsbouw en Machinefabriek v/h A. van de Grijp from the Netherlands and its Thai partners Global Boat Building Co. Ltd. and Yacht Dimension Thailand Co. Ltd. will establish a small-scale state-of-the-art shipbuilding facility in the vicinity of the town of Sattahip in Thailand. The mission of their venture is to become a producer of high quality small size motorboats which are manufactured according to and in compliance with current international standards.

The investments in this project relate to the introduction of modern manufacturing technology that is mostly new to the Thai boat building industry. The main innovative aspect of this technology is the replacement of traditional solid tropical hardwood by a sandwich type of material that uses a combination of waste wood, polyester and epoxy resin and the manufacturing in a climate controlled workshop. The waste wood is normal high quality teak wood, but it is sourced from the furniture industry, where it is disposed of as “clean production waste”.

The proposed sandwich material has excellent specifications that make it a suitable and strong construction material for boats. With this new material, boats can be manufactured weighing less than 80% of the weight of comparable polyester or wooden boats with handcrafted wood finishing. As a result, such a lightweight boat can be powered by a much lighter engine and therefore it will have low fuel consumption. In most of the target markets in Europe this is judged to be a very important customer benefit (comparable to the relevance of fuel consumption of a car or of any other means of transport).

The company will invest in production infrastructure (a climate controlled production room with air-conditioning, vapour extraction equipment and dust collection equipment, 3-phase power supply), production tools and equipment (moulds and surface working machinery, lifts, cranes etc.), project development and project management cost and in marketing.

The products will eventually be produced in four different boat types which are identified by the number indicating the length of the hull in meters, i.e. the 12.00, the 9.50, the 8.20 and the 7.20. Substantial investments have to be made in product specific production tools for each of the four types of boats. The current project covers investments in production tools for the 8.20 in the order of € 1.0 million. Follow up investments will, in due time, enable production of the 12.00, the 9.50 and the 7.20 boats. Future production of each boat type will result in recruitment and training of 25 new direct employees (15 carpenters/woodworkers and 10 polyester workers per boat type), so eventually some 100 persons will be employed. Each boat type will eventually be manufactured in production volumes of 25-30 units per year, sold in European and other high specification markets at prevailing market price levels.