Bahrain-based Arab Shipbuilding and Repair Yard (Asry) has announced it is investing $188 million in new facilities including a repair quay, an offshore fabrication area and four new tugs.

Giving details, Asry chairman Shaikh Daij bin Salmal Al-Khalifa said the repair quay would be 1.2 km long with an alongside water depth of 12 m, the offshore fabrication area would cover 200,000 sq m with a  load-out quay and the four new tugs would have a bollard-pull design with each of 45-tonne weight and 23 m length.
The tugs would be built by Asry itself, the chairman said. All the new facilities will be set up over the next two and a half years.
Shaikh Daij announced the new projects while inaugurating two new slipways built at a cost of $20 million.
Present at the opening of the new slipways were a number of Asry agents and Arab and international customers, along with guests from the shipyard’s global network representing the Greek, Indian, Danish, Norwegian, Qatari, UK, Dutch, Swiss, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Hong Kong and Brazilian markets.
Asry has an urgent requirement for the new repair quay as a lack of alongside repair berths at present is resulting in work having to be turned away, something which Sheikh Daij says “no shipyard likes to do.” 
Business at the yard is booming with its 500,000 dwt graving dock fully booked until mid-April. But CEO Chris Potter said the yard could not be complacent especially with intense competition in the ship repair industry, particularly in the Arabian Gulf area where major new shipyard facilities will enter service in Oman and Qatar by 2010.
“We are now entering a new phase in our history and we most certainly intend to compete with the best in the world,” he said.
Vessels undergoing repair at Asry during the opening of the new slipways represented shipowners from Bahrain, Brazil, India, Kuwait, Monaco, Norway, Pakistan, UAE, and the USA. 
On the new slipways undergoing repair at the time of the inauguration were the American-owned 13,571 dwt dredger Noon Island, owned by the Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co, and the 13,143 dwt bulk carrier Uco XX, owned by Bahrain’s Uco Marine Contracting.  Since entering service this May, the new slipways have repaired 11 vessels, many from the local oil and gas markets.
“Investment in the new 200,000 sq m offshore hard standing area and load-out quay is fundamental in the development of Asry’s increasing involvement in the offshore oil and gas markets,” the company said.
At the end of last year the yard established the Asry Offshore Services (AOS) Division. This is mainly to focus on the oil and gas market around Qatar and Saudi Arabia. AOS has already secured its first major contract, the upgrading of the jack-up rig Hercules 170 and is currently talking to a number of operators about other large-scale refit contracts as well as platform fabrication work.
“With the new 1.2 km repair quay and lay-down area, Asry is set to become a major player in the Middle East offshore oil and gas market,” the yard said.