USC considering entry into oil, gas equipment market - Industry and Trade Ministry
MOSCOW. Nov 13 (Interfax) - United Shipbuilding Corporation (USC) may convert some of its capacity to produce oil and gas equipment, Deputy Industry and Trade Minister Alexei Rakhmanov said.
The decision to modernize one or another plant will be made based on an appraisal of the various options for development using modeling and the appropriate methodology, which will make it possible to evaluate the technological level of the plant and the contribution a modernization would make to its development.
One direction for reorganizing the assets could be "conversion for development of other production needed for shipbuilding, including component manufacture."
"We may redirect production floors, where that is economically justified, in industrial parks, that will operate with shipbuilding enterprises and with associated industrial sectors. For example, we see a synergy with enterprises that manufacture oil and gas equipment," Rakhmanov said. One point of USC's strategy is to embark on construction of competitive shipyards, he said.
The Industry and Trade Ministry is working to agree on an analysis of the places shipyards will occupy in USC's future structure with OJSC Center for the Technology of Shipbuilding and Ship Repair, which is expected to spend all of 2014 on the job. It will be financed under the state program for civilian shipbuilding and the federal targeted program on warship building.
USC, the biggest shipbuilding group in Russia, was formed in 2007. It is wholly state owned.