Two Dutch and a Belgian dredging company are joining forces to keep the Dutch shipbuilder Royal IHC, one of their crucial suppliers, out of Chinese hands.
According to the Belgian newspaper De Tijd they have conversations to help the ailing Rotterdam company, which can result in a takeover.
Through a takeover of Royal IHC, the Chinese would lay their hands on the cutting-edge technology and knowledge of the shipbuilder.
Royal IHC builds complex and high-tech vessels for the dredging sector. It is even the world market leader in that business line. But the company from Kinderdijk is in a bad financial situation. In 2018 it lost a loss of 80 million on a turnover of 942 million euros. In the first half of 2019, the company recorded a loss as well.
The situation became so urgent that the company had to get a cash injection of 120 million euros from its banks and shareholders last summer. IHC is in the hands of the Dutch billionaire Cees de Bruin (67.8%), the investor Rabo Capital (10.9%) and his management and staff (21.3%).
Since the summer, IHC has been investigating various options to strengthen its capital. Sources indicate that a Chinese party is interested in a takeover of the shipbuilder. But Belgian and Dutch dredgers would rather not see that happen, because that would result in the innovative technology and knowledge of Royal IHC falling into Chinese hands. That would enable the Chinese to produce advanced dredging vessels and, more than just on price, to compete with Western European shipyards.
This led to discussions between the investor HAL (main shareholder of the Dutch dredging company Boskalis), the dredging company Van Oord and the shareholders of the Belgian DEME (the CFE construction group and the Ackermans & van Haaren investment group) to work together. It is unclear at what stage these discussions are. According to one source, the three plan to make a bid for Royal IHC. Another source states that it is certainly not going so fast.
An IHC spokesperson only says that they are talking to a consortium of companies to strengthen capital. The other people involved do not want to comment.