Balaena buys Cammell Laird owner in UK shipyard shake-up

The maritime engineering and shipbuilding group Balaena has acquired APCL Group, bringing the historic Cammell Laird yard at Birkenhead, A&P Tyne and A&P Falmouth together with its existing facilities in Gibraltar and Cornwall in a network of twelve dry docks spanning the United Kingdom and the Mediterranean, the company has said.

Balaena, which owns the Gibdock dry dock and dockyard facility in Gibraltar alongside a shipyard in Padstow, announced the acquisition on Wednesday, describing it as a significant milestone in its mission to expand and improve Britain’s naval shipbuilding and ship repair capability and capacity. APCL Group operates shipyards on Tyneside through A&P Tyne, at Birkenhead through Cammell Laird, and at Falmouth through A&P Falmouth and the Falmouth Docks and Engineering Company.

According to the company, the enlarged group will provide the basis for increased support to UK defence interests while offering one of the country’s most comprehensive commercial ship repair and refit networks, serving operators across the offshore energy, cargo, cruise and ferry sectors, with enhanced drydocking, hull fabrication and life-extension services. Operating under the single Balaena brand, the combined business will have a workforce of more than two thousand people across Gibraltar, Padstow, Tyne, Birkenhead and Falmouth.

The founder and group chief executive of Balaena, Simon Gillett, said the company was “delighted to welcome APCL Group into Balaena.” The acquisition, he said, reinforced a long-term commitment to British maritime capability, “creating jobs, expanding apprenticeships, and driving innovation” in line with the ambitions of the Strategic Defence Review and the UK’s Industrial Strategy. By uniting Balaena’s vision with APCL’s skilled teams, he said, the group was “strengthening the UK’s ability to deliver for both the Royal Navy and the global commercial maritime sector”, while investing in the next generation of British shipbuilders and engineers.

The chief executive of APCL Group, David McGinley, called the deal “an exciting new chapter for APCL and our workforce.” Joining Balaena, he said, “secures the future of our shipyards”, allows new investment in digital and green shipbuilding technologies, and renews the company’s commitment to working with local communities on the Tyne, at Birkenhead and at Falmouth “to create jobs, apprenticeships, and lasting prosperity.”

Balaena says it plans to invest in modernising APCL’s facilities, expanding capacity for ship repair, offshore fabrication and low-emission propulsion systems, with a new national skills and apprenticeship programme to be launched in partnership with local colleges and maritime training bodies.

The yards changing hands carry considerable weight in the British naval support landscape. Cammell Laird, one of the most storied names in British shipbuilding, built the polar research ship RRS Sir David Attenborough and holds a steady stream of Royal Navy and Royal Fleet Auxiliary dry dock and refit work on the Mersey, while A&P Falmouth has long served as a principal refit and maintenance yard for the Royal Fleet Auxiliary’s tankers and support ships, and A&P Tyne has carried out fabrication work for offshore energy and defence programmes. The consolidation of those facilities with Gibdock, a regular port of call for Royal Navy vessels operating in and through the Mediterranean, creates a repair network sitting across several of the routes the fleet uses most.

The deal also extends a period of consolidation in British shipbuilding and repair that has seen Navantia UK take over the former Harland and Wolff yards and the government promise, through the Strategic Defence Review and its shipbuilding strategy, to grow the industrial base on which the Royal Navy’s expansion plans depend.