Shipyard

A shipyard is a place that builds ships. These can be yachts, military vessels, cruise liners or other cargo or passenger ships.

Countries with large shipyards include Japan and Poland. The ship building industry tends to be more fragmented in Europe than in Asia. In European countries there are more smaller companies, compared to the fewer, larger companies in the ship building countries of Asia.

Most shipyards in the United States are privately owned, the largest of which being Northrop Grumman a multi-billion dollar 'defence enterprise'. The publically owned shipyards in the US are Naval facilities.

Yantai Raffles is the largest shipbuilder in China. It has built numerous cargo ships, tugboats and support vessels, as well as pleasure vessels such as yachts.

Shipyards are constructed by the sea to allow easy access for their ships. The site of a large shipyard will contain many specialised cranes[?], dry docks, dust-free warehouses, painting facilities and extremely large areas for fabrication of the ships.