GE Shipping drafts Rs 1038 crore capex plan

Private sector shipping firm Great Eastern Shipping Company (GE Shipping) has committed a capital expenditure of Rs 1,038 crore to acquire 10 new buildings between January 2004 and September 2005.

In shipping industry parlance, a new building means a new vessel under construction.

GE Shipping plans to acquire one Aframax vessel, two Suezmaxes, one MR product carrier, two platform supply vessels and four anchor handling tug supply vessels.

The ships will be delivered intermittently between January 2004 and September 2005.

"The company is focused on the energy sector and has strategically expanded its fleet to cater to future requirements," said Rajat Dutta, general manager of GE Shipping. The company is betting on the energy sector as for more than two decades the biggest growth in global transportation requirements has been in the energy sector, primarily oil.

GE Shipping has been on an expansion drive since it pulled out of the race for the divestment of the Shipping Corporation of India about a year back.

Since the beginning of 2003-04, the company has been expanding its crude tonnage and has added six tankers.

Recently, it has signed a contract for acquiring a 1,52,485 deadweight tonne (DWT) Suezmax carrier.

The 1989-built ship is expected to join the company's fleet by the end of this month. Earlier this month, the company had signed a contract for a second-hand Aframax crude carrier.

After the addition of the Suezmax and Aframax carriers to the fleet, GE Shipping's crude tanker tonnage will record a 288 per cent rise post-March 31, 2003.

It has also added two product carriers in the current fiscal.