SHIP YARDS SME

Ship Yards SMEs

Ship Yards SMEs

In the 1980s, the group technology driven modern shipbuilding mode was established and perfected by advanced shipbuilding countries. Intermediate product oriented organization enhanced the flexibility of shipbuilding production lines and significantly improved construction efficiency. With the coming of 21st century and the intense growth of China's shipbuilding industry, small and medium-sized shipbuilding industry has also become an essential part of the shipbuilding team. Furthermore, some of the small and medium-sized shipyards have achieved to enter the world shipbuilding market with their own brand.

However, with the advent of the economic crisis in 2008, the shipbuilding market outfaced an overcapacity situation. Production process of China 's small and medium-sized shipyards have left far behind compared to large ships and the approach of improving their own production processes vary widely. Decision makers of small and medium - sized shipbuilding companies are the one who concern about the way of improving the efficiency of the production processes.

Group technology and lean shipbuilding principles were utilized in order to attain an optimized experience in the production process activities and improve the existing shipbuilding. The long history of shipbuilding can be justified through its vital role to the societies for the last 100 years. What is more, it will continue so in the coming years because as stated from the committee (IIW Select Committee On Shipbuilding, 2011)“there is no sign of new transportation technology that can replace shipping”.

Compared to other industries, the shipbuilding industry has its own characteristic feature. What differentiate shipbuilding from other industries is that it has to sell first and then construct, in contrast with others like auto industry where first something is manufactured and then sold. Furthermore, shipyards should be reliable in order to get orders. In other words, it should deliver quality ships on time and that can be achieved by a successful accomplishment in an international competition. What is more, it has to be competitive against the best yards globally (India Goverment, 2007).Low competitiveness of the national shipyards is mainly caused by the limitation in strategic planning (Ma'ruf, 2007).

According to Ma'ruf (2007) the definition of competitiveness is “the ability to win and execute shipbuilding orders in open competition and stay in business”. Therefore, in this era of global competition the role of strategic management is significant for any business including shipbuilding industry. As stated by Michael Kami (Arthur A. Thomson, 2001) “Without a strategy the organization is like a ship without a rudder.”

Strengths, weaknesses, opportunity and threats (SWOT) analysis that is currently used by major National shipyards as a strategy formulation, are considered very general (John A. Pearce, 2000).

Due to the high complexity of the product that a shipyard offers, a large number of dexterities, scientific knowledge and smart production technologies are required. Ship is one of the most sophisticated capital goods because of the high level of operational autonomy in a hostile natural environment. The fact that the ships are the largest moving object combined with their long life cycle makes them even more ...