The vision of Marco Hoogendoorn

Visit the Holland Shipyards Group’s yard in Hardinxveld-Giessendam and you will see employees working on different types of project. Inside a workshop, plates of steel are being cut for the construction of a new hybrid ferry. Outside, multiple vessels are being converted. Marco Hoogendoorn walks around the yard that his father founded. “In this market, there is always room for improvement,” says Hoogendoorn. “As we say it, any challenge any time!”

Holland Shipyards Group is such a house hold name in the maritime industry that it is easy to forget that they are a relatively young shipyard. Founded in 1981, the company focuses on repair and conversions together with building new vessels. Rental of accommodations modules and chartering complete the portfolio. Holland Shipyards is a family-owned company and at the moment the second generation is taking a step forward. Marco Hoogendoorn, together with his brother Leendert are now responsible for the daily operations. Marco takes the commercial side, his brother focuses more on research and development. Their father, Cor Hoogendoorn, the founder of Holland Shipyards Group, has taken on a more strategic role.

Holland Shipyards started as a yard focusing on ship repair, however since 1995 they began building vessels for inland shipping. “In the period from 2005 to 2011 the market was flourishing and the order book was full. There was enough work. That changed, of course, when the maritime sector felt the economic crisis.” Holland Shipyards is known as a responsible yard, but also one that is not afraid of risks when it comes to trying something new. “When the market is good, everybody is successful. But in an economic crisis you have to reinvent yourself.”

A good example is the accommodation rental service Holland Shipyards provides. “In times when business is slow you  have to keep yourself busy and when we see an opportunity, we are not afraid to follow up on it. Based on our experience in the new building and refit market, we constructed a fleet of high quality accommodation modules for use on vessels.” They developed this side of the business for the rental market under the name Holland Accommodation Rentals. “It looks like a stranger in our midst, but it helped us through difficult times.”

“In an economic crisis you have to reinvent yourself”

Alternative forms of cash flows are necessary for a company like Holland Shipyards Group, because it wants to invest in innovation. “We are always looking for improvement, also when it comes to ship designs. For instance, Holland Shipyards Group wanted to develop and build a new generation of tug boats because we thought we could do it better. We believe that, while the ability to deliver power is a necessity, the greatest savings are to be found in the fact that most tugs and workboats operate in low power modes for the vast majority of the time.” By developing designs that are able to effectively address lighter operational modes, significant fuel and maintenance savings can be realised. “The tug and workboat market is ideally suited for hybridisation, whether this is through batteries or simpler forms. This idea resulted in the hybrid harbour and terminal tug  EDDY TUG, introduced in 2014.” 

The step towards hybridisation paid off when Holland Shipyards Group started building hybrid ferries. “Making a vessel a hybrid is not easy, but because we started early and learned along the way, we were ready when the municipal public transport operator GVB in Amsterdam put out a tender for a sustainable ferry. This resulted in the IJveer 60 /61. The vessel has a hybrid propulsion system and two engine rooms, one located in each end. In each one, a thruster, its e-motor, and two generator sets are to be found. The battery room is located amidships. The vessel’s power management system theoretically has three modes of propulsion available: diesel-electric (power from diesel generator sets), full electric (power directly from battery banks) or a combination of the two. These multiple driveline configurations provide redundancy by offering alternate sources of propulsion to the vessel. This vessel was nominated for the Ship of the Year award in 2017.

“The step towards hybridisation paid off”

Being a front runner has its advantages. “People know how to find us,” says Hoogendoorn. “When you are an early adopter of a trend like hybrid propulsion, it is sometimes difficult, because creating something new comes with mistakes. You learn and develop and now we reaping the benefits of that process.” At the moment Holland Shipyards is working on a new hybrid for the city of Kiel. This 300-passenger capacity ferry design will have a hybrid drivetrain that can be powered by either generators or by means of a battery bank. The design will be called Gaarden and delivery is scheduled for 2020. The yard  also recently presented the design of the road ferry ERF 4219, which has already been sold to a Norwegian client. “This ferry can be made full-electric, which puts it among the greenest ferry designs in the market. We have given extra attention to reducing energy consumption in all the on-board systems.” Further reflecting the company’s healthy book are two hybrid ferries for the city of Amsterdam and one fully electric ferry for a German city.   

Another new development is the presence of the company in the Port of Flushing since the beginning of this year. This part of the Holland Shipyards Group is called Flushing Marine & Offshore (FMO). It provides deep sea berths, quayside and has crane and storage capacity. It aims to service the offshore industry, including renewables, by providing a (de)mobilization yard and possibilities for storage of mission equipment. With this expansion the company creates a stronger foothold in the offshore market. Two rigs have already been converted, one to a decommissioning rig another one to compress gas.

Together with Werkendam and Hardinxveld-Giessendam, Flushing is Holland Shipyards Group’s in the Netherlands. The company also owns TV Dredging. In the last three years this company delivered a large series of standardised Plain Suction Dredgers. Holland Shipyards Group also runs a yard in Sierra-Leone, Africa. The yard is available for drydocking, inspections, in-situ repair and floating repairs. “Although Africa is a growing market, we are not primarily in it for the money. My father started this yard for transferring knowledge and bring development to Sierra Leone.”

With the two brothers in charge, do not expect a radical change of course. “At the moment we are focusing on the current activities. Work with the product combinations that we have, deepening our work. We are very excited about our recent orders for ferries. It looks like we have become a specialist in that market ,”  concludes Hoogendoorn with a smile.      

This article was previously published in Maritime Holland magazine, issue 4, 2019.