is a major Japanese

ship building Shipbuilding is the construction of ships and other floating vessels. In modern times, it normally takes place in a specialized facility known as a shipyard. Shipbuilders, also called shipwrights, follow a specialized occupation that traces i ...

, marine engineering, and service company headquartered in Imabari,

Ehime Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located on the island of Shikoku. Ehime Prefecture has a population of 1,334,841 and a geographic area of 5,676 km2 (2,191 sq mi). Ehime Prefecture borders Kagawa Prefecture to the northeast, Toku ...

, Japan. It is Japan's largest shipbuilder both in terms of tonnage and sales revenue, with design, research, construction and ship repair facilities in Imabari, Marugame and at seven other integrated dockyard and manufacturing facilities across the

Seto Inland Sea The , sometimes shortened to the Inland Sea, is the body of water separating Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu, three of the four main islands of Japan. It serves as a waterway connecting the Pacific Ocean to the Sea of Japan. It connects to Osaka Ba ...

region. Imabari Shipbuilding's products include the design, manufacture, purchase and sale of merchant ships, offshore engineering and ship life cycle services. Imabari Shipbuilding also controls various subsidiaries related to the shipbuilding and shipping industries, including one of the largest Japanese ship owning, managing, and leasing (chartering) companies Shoei Kisen Kaisha, which manages and provides ships to shipping companies under long term

charterparty A charterparty (sometimes charter-party) is a maritime contract between a shipowner and a hirer ("charterer") for the hire of either a ship for the carriage of passengers or cargo, or a yacht for leisure. Charterparty is a contract of carria ...

agreements. The company is privately held and tightly controlled and run by the Higaki family. In 2016 it reported commercial vessel production as measured by cargo-carrying capacity for a total of about 4 million tons, six times more than Mitsubishi Heavy and seven times more than Mitsui Engineering. Its revenue in that year totaled 373.4 billion yen ($3.43 billion). Globally, it boasts the fourth-largest market share, after South Korean rivals

Hyundai Heavy Industries HD Hyundai Heavy Industries Co., Ltd. (HHI; ) is the world's largest shipbuilding company and a major heavy equipment manufacturer. Its headquarters are in Ulsan, South Korea. History HHI was founded in 1972 by Chung Ju-yung as a division ...

and Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering.

History

First established in 1901, shipbuilding facilities in Ehime Prefecture were consolidated under the Imabari Shipbuilding name in 1942. Over its existence, Imabari has acquired some of its competitors, including, lately, in 2018, the Japanese shipbuilder Minaminippon Shipbuilding Co., Ltd. Minaminippon is based in

Ōita Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located on the island of Kyūshū. Ōita Prefecture has a population of 1,081,646 (1 February 2025) and has a geographic area of 6,340 km2 (2,448 sq mi). Ōita Prefecture borders Fukuoka Prefecture to the northwest, K ...

on the southern island of

Kyushu is the third-largest island of Japan's Japanese archipelago, four main islands and the most southerly of the four largest islands (i.e. excluding Okinawa Island, Okinawa and the other Ryukyu Islands, Ryukyu (''Nansei'') Ryukyu Islands, Islands ...

, and was formerly controlled by the

Mitsui is a Japanese corporate group and '' keiretsu'' that traces its roots to the ''zaibatsu'' groups that were dissolved after World War II. Unlike the ''zaibatsu'' of the pre-war period, there is no controlling company with regulatory power. Ins ...

group through its affiliates Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding Co., Ltd. (25 percent) and Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, Ltd. (24 percent). On January 1, 2021, Imabari Shipbuilding (with 51% of shares) merged into a new joint venture with

Japan Marine United (informally JMU) is a Japanese ship building marine engineering and service company headquartered in Yokohama, Japan. It's Japan's second largest shipbuilder after Imabari Shipbuilding, with shipyard facilities in Kure, Hiroshima, Yokohama, Na ...

('JMU') (with 49% of shares) named Nihon Shipyard, covering all ship types except LNG tankers. Nihon Shipyard is headquartered in Tokyo, with a staff of 500. In parallel, Imabari Shipbuilding bought 35% of JMU's capital. Nihon Shipyard designs, builds and promotes zero-emission vessels. The cooperation between these two Japanese companies make it one of the largest marine engineering and shipbuilding companies in the world.

Current facilities

Imabari Shipbuilding currently operates nine ship building and maintenance facilities as well as marketing offices in Tokyo and Amsterdam. Plans were announced in January 2015 to build a new purpose-built

dry dock A dry dock (sometimes drydock or dry-dock) is a narrow basin or vessel that can be flooded to allow a load to be floated in, then drained to allow that load to come to rest on a dry platform. Dry docks are used for the construction, maintenance, ...

facility at Marugame for the fabrication of a new generation of

container ship A container ship (also called boxship or spelled containership) is a cargo ship that carries all of its load in truck-size intermodal containers, in a technique called containerization. Container ships are a common means of commercial intermodal ...

s in excess of 20,000 TEU. The facility was completed in 2017, measuring long, wide, and deep, and costing 400 billion yen.

References

{{Authority control Shipbuilding companies of Japan Vehicle manufacturing companies established in 1901 Japanese companies established in 1901 Companies based in Ehime Prefecture Defunct defense companies of Japan

History

Current facilities

See also

References