Homo sapiens

Everyone carefully checked every detail of the module and found no obvious problems.

Then they talked about the cost of shipbuilding.

Ino, a hull engineer at the shipyard, joked with a smile: "If this technology is successful, then when we expand production capacity in the future, we won't need to recruit so many technicians."

"That's inevitable, otherwise the company wouldn't attach so much importance to this technology." Huang Weida replied with a smile.

The integrated hull manufacturing technology in front of us is actually a variant of biosynthetic material technology.

The hull outline of the ship is quickly formed through prefabricated modular templates. A special plastic tarpaulin is laid inside the shell of the template. Finally, nutrient solution, metal ion solution, hormones and pheromones are continuously injected to allow the materials to move along the shell. The body grows on its own.

They have tested transport ships with a displacement of 20,000 tons before, and now the experimental transport ship is an 80,000-ton 6,500TEU standard container ship.

Ino asked: "What is the current international quotation?"

A cost engineer replied: "Mitsubishi Heavy Industries' quotation is US$15,000 per TEU, Samsung Heavy Industries, Hyundai Heavy Industries and Daewoo Shipbuilding are US$14,600 per TEU, and China Shipbuilding Industry Corporation is US$14,200 per TEU. "

[Note: TEU means standard container]

Ino raised an eyebrow: "In other words, their cost is about US$13,000 to US$14,000 per TEU?"

"Yes, if it was a previous low-price order, based on the current cost, they are actually doing a loss-making business."

Huang Weida was somewhat curious about the company's production costs: "What are our costs?"

"If it is an old technology, we actually only have a cost advantage on dual-purpose transport ships. The shipbuilding costs of other ships are about 7 to 8% lower than other shipbuilding companies." The cost engineer explained.

Huang Weida continued to ask: "How much cost can be reduced by the new process?"

The cost engineer thought for a while before answering this question: "We are still evaluating, and we roughly estimate that it can be reduced by about 50%!"

"So many?" Huang Weida was shocked.

According to statistics from the International Shipping Organization: the manufacturing cost of a civilian ship consists of 30% labor, 25% steel, 12% power system, 12% cabin equipment and deck equipment, 6% communication and navigation system, 5% power and electrical equipment, Other ship supporting facilities 5%, design and management 5%.

It can be seen from here that labor + steel + power system + cabin equipment and deck equipment account for 79% of the total shipbuilding cost.

You must know that the manufacturing of large ships often requires the consumption of a large amount of steel and a large amount of labor.

The shipbuilding profit margin is usually 5 to 10% of the construction cost superimposed on the contract quotation, so the contract quotation will be 105% to 110% of the total cost.

Labor is okay, after all, employee wages will not fluctuate much.

But the price of steel is a serious problem.

Assume that shipyard A received an order in January this year. When calculating the cost at that time, the cost of steel was US$600 per ton. However, in July this year, the price of steel rose to US$900 per ton.

This means that the total cost will increase by about 12.5% ​​to 112.5%. At this time, the order will suffer a loss of at least 2.5% to 7.5%.

Although sometimes contracts are signed when steel prices are high, and steel prices fall during the shipbuilding period, higher profits can be obtained.

The problem is that shipping companies are not fools. They will also evaluate the market price of steel.

Unless it is a very popular LNG ship, shipping companies such as ordinary container ships, dry bulk carriers, ro-ro ships, oil tankers, etc. will often choose to place orders during a period when steel prices are low.

Now, the three major shipbuilding countries in the world are in a state of vicious competition. In order to grab orders, they often lower each other's prices.

For orders for ships of the same level and type, the quotations of Chinese shipbuilding companies are often lower than those of South Korean and Japanese shipbuilding companies.

Take an LNG ship with a capacity of 174,000 cubic meters (about 100,000 tons of deadweight) as an example.

Samsung Heavy Industries' quotation is about US$250 million, and the profit is about US$12.5 million; while Chinese shipbuilding companies usually quote US$240 million. Even if the labor costs and steel are slightly cheaper, the profit is only about US$10 million.

This vicious competition leads to slight fluctuations in steel costs, and shipbuilding companies will face losses.

Tens of millions of tons of ships are built in a year, but the total industry profit is only more than one billion US dollars. This is the current dilemma of the shipbuilding industry.

In fact, the three major shipbuilding countries in East Asia all know that this cannot continue, but they cannot stop at all and can only continue to roll in until the other two are completely destroyed and then monopolize the entire shipbuilding industry. Only then can this vicious competition be ended.

As the fourth largest shipbuilding country in the world, what should Luzon do when faced with this situation?

In fact, there is no way to change the current situation, we can only participate in the involution.

Fortunately, the New Luzon Shipbuilding Company has the full support of Homo sapiens Corporation, and it has the blessing of various new technologies.

The cost engineer gave everyone a rough explanation:

"After using the integrated manufacturing of the hull, we can reduce the waste of raw materials by 10 to 25%. In addition, our hull material is silicon aluminum steel, and the material cost is about 40% of the original; the labor cost is about 33% of the original; the power system has now been Complete localization, probably about 75% of the original level."

Huang Weida, Yi Nuo and others are all good at mathematics. After thinking about it in their minds, they calculated the approximate situation.

The current costs of major shipbuilding companies in East Asia are used as a reference base value.

The labor cost of the New Luzon Shipyard is 10%, the material cost is 10%, the power system cost is 9%, and other costs are 21%.

Its total cost is equivalent to about 50% of the major shipbuilding companies in East Asia.

This is because we need to leave enough profits for other brother companies, otherwise the cost can be reduced by about 10%.

In other words, the cost for Samsung Heavy Industries to build a 6,500TEU container ship is about US$84.5 million.

However, New Luzon Shipbuilding Company can build the same 6,500TEU container ship at a cost of only about US$42.25 million.

Obviously this gap is already very scary.

The cost engineer said with a smile: "Actually, everyone still ignores another advantage of our company."

"Another advantage?" Huang Weida didn't react for a while.

"It's the speed of shipbuilding." the cost engineer reminded.

Immediately everyone present reacted.

The shipbuilding speed of the New Luzon Shipyard is indeed very fast, which can even be described as rapid.

Taking the 6,500TEU container ship in front of us as an example, if new processes are used, the hull can be completed in about two months.

Then start the secondary adjustment of the internal cabin, installation of the gas turbine, manufacturing of the ship island, installation of supporting equipment, and finally outfitting.

It is estimated that it will take 130 to 140 days to complete the construction of the ship.

This speed is simply a drag compared to other large ships that can easily be built within a year or two by other shipbuilding companies.

The unit cost is only about 50%, and the unit construction time is less than half.

The advantages accumulated by New Luzon Shipbuilding Company in various aspects become more obvious when added together.

"Technology is indeed the primary productive force." Huang Weida sighed.

Ino turned around and asked: "Designer Huang, I heard that the ship design center also plans to add some energy-saving designs?"

Huang Weida nodded: "Yes, we are studying it, but it is not tested on this experimental ship. It will most likely be tested on the next ship."

"What is the design?" another engineer asked curiously.

Huang Weida did not hide it, but directly introduced several energy-saving plans to everyone.

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