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www.marinelink.com 57fact, as Zamil?s Shipbuilding group works towards opening its new shipyard, Nor Crane has been invited to open up a workshop on the premises of the new ship-yard to better facilitate its services in the region.?We have a special relationship with Zamil, and we are in the process to establish a company in Dammam,? Nilsen said. Zamil is building a new shipyard ? a $250m investment ? in the new shipyard in Dammam ? which will feature the biggest ship lift (a Rolls-Royce 9,000 ton Synchrolift) in the Middle East. ?We were asked by them if we are interested to do fabrication with them, and we said, ?yes,? and that would be Þ rst for the Saudi market,? said Nilsen. ?That means we will fabricate all steelwork for winches and cranes in Saudi, for Saudi market.?While Zamil Offshore is an important client, it cer- tainly is not the only. In fact by volume India is Nor Crane?s main market, and currently it has $10m in or- ders at the ABG shipyard for 130 bollard pull anchor handlers, four complete ship sets of 300-ton anchor handling winches. Nor Crane also recently received an order from Mubarak for all of the mooring equip-ment (eight-point mooring systems) for a series of new barges, and it also recently delivered to Schlumberger in Indonesia two 25-ton cranes for some swamp barges, fully classed, fully explosion proof as they are working in a gas area.Nor Crane is a specialist engineering company, fo- cusing on cranes in the 10-15 tons range, as well as the manufacture of smaller offshore cranes. It?s a small company, with a 2012 turnover of $20m according to Nilsen, but a competitive company, and one that was shaped mightily by the global economic crisis of 2008. ?Before 2008 we had an order book of $140m; now we have an orderbook of $10m,? Nilsen said. ?The market has been really tough; and when things get tough, the competition gets much tougher. But we are very com- petitive.?Today the company numbers 35 world- wide, a size that suites Nilsen for the mo-ment, but may have to change as it mulls new opportunities in far-away places, such as cracking into the insular Brazilian market. But Nilsen tries his best to keep it focused and simple. ?The company is still relatively young, and when you?re running around try-ing to take some business from the big guys, you need some references. Our references are to use components in our systems that are recognizable, readily available.? The prem- ise is simple in that having readily available components when they?re needed, where they?re needed, is central to long-term suc-cess in the mobile, global maritime and off- shore markets.?When I started the company in 2004, I wanted to grow it big,? Nilsen said. ?After 2008, I changed the company a lot. I went into the market relatively cheap, and it has taken me many years to bring the prices back to where they should be. And now I appreciate perhaps a smaller volume of orders at higher margins, versus a higher volume of orders at smaller margins.? With a new workshop in Dubai Maritime City, manu- facturing capabilities in the UAE and China and test beds in Singapore, Dubai and China, Nor Crane seems well situated to further expand its inß uence across the region and the world, one ship set at a time.(Photo: Greg Trauthwein) While Zamil Offshore is an important client, it certainly is not the only. In fact by volume India is Nor Crane?s main market , and currently it has $10m in orders at the ABG shipyard for 130 bollard pull anchor han- dlers, four complete ship sets of 300-ton anchor handling winches.MR #4 (50-57).indd 57MR #4 (50-57).indd 574/3/2013 1:48:52 PM4/3/2013 1:48:52 PM
