Taiwanese ship owners turn to Korean shipbuilders amid cross-strait tension

Samsung Heavy Industries Co.’s container ship [Photo provided by Samsung Heavy Industries]

South Korean shipbuilders are being favored by Taiwanese shipping companies and ship owners as they are chosen over the Chinese peers amid the cross-strait conflict between China and Taiwan.

According to the shipbuilding industry on Tuesday, Samsung Heavy Industries Co., one of Korea’s three major shipbuilders, has been shortlisted for a container order from Taiwan’s Evergreen Marine Ltd.

The Korean shipbuilder is poised to compete with Japan Marine United Corp. Evergreen Marine is bidding for 24 16,000 twenty-foot equivalent unit (TEU) dual-fuel container ships. The contract is estimated to be worth $4 billion.

Evergreen Marine invited Korean, Chinese, and Japanese shipbuilders to participate in the tender but only shortlisted the Korean and Japanese candidates.

Samsung Heavy Industries, in particular, has a long partnership of working with Evergreen Marine. In March 2021, it won an order to build 20 15,000 TEU container ships from Evergreen Marine. The order was valued at 2.8 trillion won ($2.2 billion).

The Korean shipbuilder has also continued its business with Taiwan’s Wan Hai Lines Ltd. In March last year, it signed an order for five container ships worth 803.6 billion won.

HD Korea Shipbuilding & Offshore Engineering Co. has recently signed a contract with Taiwan’s YangMing Marine Transport Corp. to build 15,000 TEU liquefied natural gas (LNG)-powered container ships. The order is worth 1.23 trillion won.

In March 2021, HD Korea Shipbuilding & Offshore Engineering also won a contract for five 13,200 TEU container ships from Wan Hai Lines. In the contract worth 63.7 billion won, the Korean shipbuilder has delivered ships from the first half of this year.

Hyundai Mipo Dockyard Co. signed a contract worth 119.4 billion won with Evergreen Marine in December 2019 to build 4 container ships. Hanwha Ocean Co., formerly Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co., however, has not won any orders from Taiwan since the 2010s.

Industry insiders expected that the prolonged cross-strait conflict between China and Taiwan could provide an opportunity for Korean shipbuilders to create new partnerships.

“If the conflict intensifies, more Taiwanese ship owners will shun Chinese shipbuilders,” said an unnamed industry source. “Korean shipbuilders have had good relations with Taiwan and are competitive in terms and quality, so Korean shipbuilders may increasingly be sought.”