History

March 1st,1969 marked the official birthday of the Western Shipyard and later the same year, on July 18th, the first ship was docked for repair.

In 1975, having more than 2600 employees, the second yard-workshop construction phase began. The Western Shipyard repaired trawlers, refrigerators, plants, and other fishing vessels.

After the downfall of the USSR, huge fishing fleets became a burden for the Republic of Lithuania and many ships were sold or written down to scrap. In 1993, the company restructured its activity and turned their focus to repairing ships from Western countries. Ever since then, the company has continued to strengthen its international market.

The Greek bulker “Marika“ was the first Western ship to come for repair.

A Norwegian group called Western Invest AS privatized the company in 1998, which officially started ship building in the company – its first fishing vessel,”Vendla“ was built. However, after the Norwegians‘ failure to follow up on financial obligations, the Estonian Concern BLRT Grupp AS acquired the controlling interest of the company, which at the time was called Western Shiprepair Yard, in 2001.

After a successful reorganization in 2003, the company was restructured into what is today known as the Western Shipyard Group.

In 2010, the Western Baltija Shipbuilding was founded when the two largest Lithuanian ship building companies Western Shipbuilding Yard and “Baltija” Shipbuilding Yard merged. With united experience and a realization of potential strengths in projects, the Western Baltija Shipbuilding has become a strong and competitive partner and has become stronger in the area of shipbuilding business.

In 2011, the Western Shipyard and the Finnish company “ MacGregor“ established their joint company, “MacGregor BLRT Baltic“, which is a global level ship-crane, hatch cover, ramp production and repair company whose goal is to improve customer operation by making it run more efficiently.

In November 2017, Western Shipyard signed an agreement to acquire a 100% stake of Marine Technology AS, a Norwegian company engaged in the management of engineering projects. Today, the Western Shipyard Group is one of the largest marine engineering corporations in Lithuania. Currently, the group incorporates 21 companies that specialize in different fields of activity, and provides all services related to the life cycle of a ship.