Rolls-Royce builds Norway base

Rolls-Royce is a leading international company with a major and growing base for its marine activities in Norway. As such it has a vital stake in advancing Norway’s credentials as a leading exporter of products and services to the global market.

Oddbjorn Eliassen, Rolls-Royce executive vice-president marine, told Norwegian Solutions that Norway accounts for about 50 per cent of the company’s marine turnover, of which the offshore sector is the main driver. Rolls-Royce has offshore industry hubs in Houston and in Singapore.

A great number of hi-tech marine products are made in Scandinavia, but the manufacture of some more standard products has been switched to lower cost locations such as in Poland and China.

“We have prospects for gas engines in China and North America. Now, when the merchant newbuild market is so low, our gas engine projects offer a lot of opportunities and business.”

Mr Eliassen said that Rolls-Royce is already well established in Brazil. “We have a big share of offshore vessels design and equipment in Brazil which will continue to be the main market, with big investments there. We have vessel designs able to work in all current and expected operational conditions and we have a good reputation with our vessels recognised as leading technology.”

Mr Eliassen said that he believes that despite the rapid growth of engineering and technical capability in growing markets such as China, “Norway can continue to fight off competition from overseas. Singapore and Shanghai have core engineering skills and qualifications, but lack long experience and co-operation with owners and operators. They are trying to build that up but it takes time.”

However, the main potential bottleneck for Norway is access to engineers. “We cannot compete with the numbers being trained and educated in India and China. So we will have to import engineers and work globally. But we will try to keep core competences and design expertise and experience here.”NS