“The bulk of the company’s current orderbook relates to AA Turki Group (ATCO), a Saudi Arabia-based service company for Aramco,” said Mustafa Kemal Torlak, chairman of the Tor Group. “We have an order for 19 tugs, service and recovery vessels, and pilot boats, for the Saudi Seaports Authority’s operations in Jeddah and Jizan. We have delivered nine so far, and the remaining 11 will arrive by 2018.”
The company is also building a patrol boat for ATCO for the Khafji Joint Operation oil-field based on the Saudi-Kuwaiti border in the northern Gulf. “This vessel is now on its way to Bahrain,” said Torlak.
Tor Marine, a subsidiary of the construction-to-shipbuilding conglomerate Tor Group, was established in its current form in the early 1980’s. It is widening its interest to the Red Sea and would be concentrating on the Middle East market over the next two years, Torlak said.
In addition to ship construction and repair, Tor Marine is developing capabilities in several other services, including salvage, wreck removal, bunker and cargo removal and recovery from wreck, towage and floating crane services, underwater operations and survey and offshore geotechnical investigation.
“The company also builds shipyards. We built three. There are around 120 yards in Turkey. Only 65 are in operation. Turkish shipbuilding [is still improving]. The global crisis affected many yards,” he said.
Established in 2011, the Tor Group of companies is an industrial‐commercial group of several entities engaged or connected with the shipbuilding and repair industry. The company is owned and operated by the Torlak Family who claim over hundred years of maritime experience.
Torlak said company growth was doubling every year and expected this to continue for the next three-four years. Despite this, he said the yard was operating at only 20% of capacity and was capable of building 15 tug-boats and six-eight AHTS per year, depending on size.
The yard has a newbuilding capacity maximum of a 25,000 dwt per vessel today. Before the global financial crisis, Tor Marine also built several general cargo vessels, bulk carriers, and product and chemical tankers, as well as workboats, including tugs and outfitting and repair vessels, and also carries out conversions and completions, and yacht-building. It also carries out drydockings.
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