Tsuneishi to hire 4,000 workers

By Ehda M. Dagooc (The Freeman) Updated August 08, 2009 12:00 AM

CEBU, Philippines - While the FBMA Marine Inc., had decided to cease its operations due to weak demand, another Aboitiz partly owned shipbuilding firm Tsuneishi Heavy Industries Cebu Inc., (THICI) is on the other hand, expanding its operations and will be hiring at least 4,000 workers.

THICI director Roberto Aboitiz said that after the P12 billion expansion project was recently completed, Tsuneishi will hire additional workers that would make the company employ a total of 9,000 manpower in the next three months.

Although its another shipbuilding firm, FBMA has been adversely affected by the global meltdown, Aboitiz said Cebu has shown that it can build high-quality vessels and Tsuneishi’s expansion is a testament to that.

Tsuneishi is one of the world’s leading medium-sized shipbuilders. Shipbuilding, ship repair and manufacturing of outfittings for ships and vessels constitute the main business of the company. Being diverse and multi-affiliated, THICI also engages in the engineering and fabrication services.

The P12 billion-expansion included the construction of a fourth slipway, which allows THICI to build Panamax bulk carrier cargo vessels to up to 190,000 tons.

In the next two years, the company also plans to increase its building capacity from 14 vessels a year to 22 with the new 900-meter dock in full operation.

According to Aboitiz, Tsuneishi continues to enjoy good demand from overseas market. In fact, the company is fully-booked for orders up to 2013 and more projects being pursued to fill up the work schedule.

Tsuneishi reported US$886.813 million worth of exports in 2008. It delivered its 97th vessel in July—the 58,000-deadweight tonnage Medi Segesta to Orient Line Co. Ltd. The P12-billion project was registered with the Board of Investments.

It is a joint venture between Japanese-owned Tsuneishi Holdings which holds 80-percent stake in the company, while Cebu-based Aboitiz & Co. Inc. owns the remaining 20 percent.

Tsuneishi, is the single largest employer in western Cebu. It maintain 6,065 contractual workers (most of who are welders), and 400 regular employees.

Recently, Aboitiz announced that FBMA, another partly-owned shipbuilding company of the Aboitiz Group, had to stop its operations due to the weak demand from the global market.

FBMA, which specializes in high-speed vessels and utility craft, had to let go of the remaining 100 workers as the global economic crisis caused companies to scrap fleet expansions.