There was a claim that for domestic shipbuilders to effectively target the U.S. market, which has recently emerged as a new growth engine, they should focus on winning contracts for logistics support ships or maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) of naval vessels rather than building warships. Because security around weapons systems for strategic warships such as nuclear submarines is strict, it is realistic to first capture immediately accessible MRO demand.
Kim Se-jin, head of the Trade and Industry Policy Center at Shin & Kim LLC, said on the 2nd at the Shin & Kim LLC headquarters in Jung-gu, Seoul, at the "Korea-U.S. shipbuilding cooperation and corporations' business opportunities seminar," "The naval logistics support ship is the most similar to the construction of commercial ships, where Korean shipbuilders rank No. 1 in the world," adding, "Korea is most likely to win contracts on its own and will be highly competitive."
The prospects were even stronger for winning MRO contracts for non-combat ships. Kwon Hyo-jae, a researcher at the Institute of Marine Systems Engineering at Seoul National University, said, "It is known that the laundry room and bathrooms of the Ford, a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier, had problems during the recent U.S.-Iran war," adding, "I heard the expense to repair it is 4 trillion won and the period is three years." Kwon added, "In the United States, arguments are growing that MRO should be entrusted to overseas shipbuilders."
According to the shipbuilding industry, MRO for the U.S. 7th Fleet is currently carried out mainly in Japan, but Southeast Asia, including Korea, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines, is also jumping into the competition for orders. Kwon said, "Japan, which hosts the homeport of the 7th Fleet, is likely to monopolize combat ship MRO, but there is enough demand to capture for non-combat ships," emphasizing, "We should compete with Japan while also cooperating."
Kwon also assessed that building strategic warships is currently difficult. He said, "Fincantieri, a European shipbuilder, agreed to receive orders for about 20 warships and acquired a U.S. shipyard, but actual orders were limited to two, and expenses surged, ultimately leaving it as a failure case," advising, "Taking this as a 'lesson learned,' domestic companies should approach the market focusing on logistics support ships, not strategic warships."
Participants agreed that it will not be easy to revise the U.S. "Jones Act," which requires that "transporting goods within the United States must be done on ships made in the United States." However, as there was a case where enforcement of the Jones Act was postponed for the first time in history due to the recent rise in international oil prices, there was also an outlook that the situation could change if a sense of crisis over the decline of the shipbuilding industry grows in the United States.