Jan De Nul in 2019: Challenging Year for Dredging

Jan De Nul Group has just released their business figures for the past year, saying that in line with previous years, 2019 remained a challenging year for international dredging activities.

Market conditions have not yet revived public and private investments. On the other hand, activity in the offshore segment increased significantly, said the company.

The civil engineering activities of the Group are holding up well, thanks to a strong real estate market in combination with some important projects on the infrastructure market. The environmental activities, the smallest branch of activity of Jan De Nul Group, remains stable.

In 2019, Jan De Nul Group was therefore once again able to exceed a total turnover of 2 billion Euro.

The EBITDA amounted to 342 million euro or 16.84% of our turnover, a great performance and in the leading group of the sector. Jan De Nul Group continues to distinguish itself from its competitors by its extremely strong balance sheet, with capital and reserves of over 2.9 billion euro and a solvency ratio of no less than 68%.

Furthermore, the group can boast a persistently strong liquidity position with a net cash surplus of 465 million euro, the company said.

Jan De Nul focuses on replacement investments in small and medium-sized dredging vessels:

• In March and April of 2019, the 3,500m³ TSHDs Afonso de Albuquerque, Diogo Cão and Tristão da Cunha were delivered by Keppel Shipyard in Nantong, China. The vessels are currently operating in South America, Europe and the Far East.
• The 6,000m³ TSHD Sanderus was delivered by Keppel in Singapore at the end of 2019. Sister vessel Ortelius is expected to be delivered mid-2020.
• In December of 2019, the 18,000m³ TSHD Galileo Galilei was launched by COSCO shipyard in Dalian in China. The delivery is scheduled for 2020.
• In October 2019, Jan De Nul Group acquired the vessel Willem van Rubroeck in Croatia by submitting the highest bid in a public auction. This cutter suction dredger had been ordered a few years earlier by Jan De Nul Group with the Uljanik shipyard. The latter was declared bankrupt in 2019. In the end, the property of the non-completed vessel was transferred to Jan De Nul Group in February 2020. In April 2020, the vessel was transported to the shipyard Remontowa in Poland, where it will be completed. The vessel will be ready and deployable in 2021.