Onex Shipyards & Technologies Group, and shipbuilder Fincantieri signed an agreement on Friday for a production and maintenance line of corvettes at the Elefsis Shipyards.
The ceremony took place at the Development & Investment Ministry of Greece were Fincantieri´s CEO Pierroberto Folgiero and the Onex President and CEO Panos Xenokostas have signed the agreement, in the presence of the Minister Adonis Georgiadis, the Deputy Minister Nikos Papathanasis, Mr. Dario Deste General Manager Naval Vessels Division of Fincantieri SpA, and the Ambassador of Italy to Greece, Mrs. Patrizia Falcinelli. The agreement for the construction of 2+1 state-of-the-art technology and high standard corvettes at Onex Elefsis Shipyards and the necessary upgrades, improvements, know-how & transfer of technology, equipment, is estimated at approximately 80 million euros, according to a statement from the Ministry of Development and Investment.
The deal will bring the creation of 2,500 new job openings in the shipbuilding sector, and multiplier-benefits for the Greek economy and defense, along with the prospect of further collaborations between the two groups in future programs to build war and merchant ships.
The Agreement is an important step towards strengthening domestic defense production. The know-how that will be acquired through the ONEX – Fincantieri collaboration will be an important cornerstone as it will give a greater impetus to the regeneration of the Elefsina Shipyards, as the Minister Adonis Georgiadis pointed out.
As it was highlighted in the statement of the Ministry, “the revival of the operation of the Elefsis Shipyards gives a new dynamic to a very strong sector that flourished in the past but at the same time this strengthening supports and will support a very strong merchant fleet since Greece has the strongest merchant fleet in the world”.
The CEO of Fincantieri, Mr. Pierroberto Folgiero stated: «our manufacturing strategy is based on a proven model to increase the efficiency of the local partner with technology transfer, exploiting synergies and interconnections between production in Italy and Greece, with a long-term strategy. We are also exploiting a unique feature of the Italian defence industry, where a network of small and medium-sized companies works with global ones: this is exactly what we want to implement in Greece in order to do the Elefsina shipyards a point of reference”.
