OPV Market in Growth Mode

The total number of Offshore Patrol Vessels (OPVs), the fastest growing segment of the naval vessels market, ordered last year marked a 4 percent increase, while the number of planned orders has also increased by 4 percent, OPV Market Report for 2015-2016 by Defence iQ finds.

At least 24 countries are known to have a total of 136 OPVs on order and 30 countries have plans for up to another 276 at a total value of over USD 60 billion.

The total number of OPVs in operation worldwide has increased from 681 to 776 last year, but an additional 49 Chinese and 16 Taiwanese vessels, now classified as OPVs have been added to the total.

Disregarding these additional vessels, the world OPV fleet has actually grown by 4.4 percent last year.

Asia has the largest proportion of the current fleet (44%) and the numbers on order (46%). Japan and India have 50% of the Asian vessels between them, while India alone has 26% of the total vessels on order worldwide, the report shows.

The proportion of the total number of OPVs on order worldwide, in South America, has increased from 13%-15% over the last year, while in Europe, the proportion on order has increased from 8% to 19% of the worldwide total and in North America, from 6% to 15%.

OPVs can be broadly classified into high-end war-fighting vessels with expensive weapon systems and C4I suites and more basic patrol vessels, designed for sustained low intensity missions and equipped with basic gun armaments.

According to the report, the majority of OPV programmes are of the lowcost, multi-role variety.

These are being used in an increasing number of roles, including fishery protection, pollution control, firefighting, salvage or search and rescue (SAR), counter-narcotics, humanitarian operations and exclusive economic zone (EEZ) patrol.