[Aju News DB]
Hyundai Heavy Industries said Friday it would temporarily shut one of its two factories for offshore facilities by the end of March as new orders drop sharply amid a global business slump.
The slide in oil prices led to a decline in new orders for facilities such as FPSO (Floating, Production, Storage and Offloading) units and oil rigs, a company spokesman said, declining to say when the factory would reopen.
The company’s offshore engineering division won 1.17 billion US dollars worth of new orders in the first 11 months of 2015, far below its yearly target of $5.3 billion, company officials said.
Hit by a protracted slowdown in the global shipbuilding industry, Hyundai Heavy reported a net loss of 434.1 billion won ($383 million) in the third-quarter, much bigger than analysts had expected.
The deficit highlights the continued challenges facing Hyundai Heavy and other South Korean shipbuilders, which shifted their strategy to focus on deep-sea drilling rigs and production facilities after the global financial crisis damped orders and Chinese shipyards out-priced them.
By Alex Lee
reporter
Park Sae-jin
swatchsjp@ajunews.com
