Meyer Acquires Turku Shipyard

 

The Meyer family, operating the shipbuilding company Meyer Werft in Germany, and the Finnish State acquired Turku shipyard from STX Europe in September 2014. Meyer Werft took up 70 percent of the shares, and the State of Finland purchased 30 percent of the share capital through the Finnish Industry Investment Ltd (FII).

As usual for the FII´s investment policy, it exits from its investments. In the case of the Turku shipyard, it was agreed that Meyer had a call option to buy FII’s minority stake in the shipyard.

Meyer has now decided to further invest in Turku shipyard using the call option.

“At the time of the purchase Meyer was only operating shipyards in Germany and therefore going to invest in Finland was a big and strategic step for us – which we carefully considered from different angles. Our well-coordinated acquisition with the Finnish Government made it possible for us to implement this strategic move, and I am sincerely grateful for the government for its valuable contribution. In general, I hope that our decision to buy all the shares is received as a sign of confidence that we can make Turku shipyard a long term shipbuilding success”, says Jan Meyer, Chief Executive Officer of Meyer Turku.

“We are happy to see that the Turku shipyard is developing so positively. Our engagement was an investment in Finnish strengths – the shipyard and the strong maritime cluster.  It is good to see that Meyer is sharing our confidence and further invests in the Turku shipyard.  This benefits not only the yard but also the maritime cluster and Finland at large”, says Jan Vapaavuori, the Finnish Minister of Economic Affairs.

“Meyer has had a great start in Finland bringing a lot of new orders to Turku. I want to congratulate Meyer and the whole shipyard for a fine start in Finland”, concludes Minister Vapaavuori.

The change in the ownership  structure is expected to become effective within the next weeks.