Cornish marine engineering company expands in Barcelona

A CORNISH marine hydraulics company has expanded its workshop in Spain as it targets the luxury yacht market.

Falmouth-based Armada Engineering’s new workshop is located at MB92 Barcelona, one of the largest superyacht refit shipyards in the world, with a 220 metres dry dock and 4,800-tonne shiplift among its facilities.

Already, five staff from Falmouth are based in the Spanish city, and since operating in Barcelona the company has worked on more than 20 superyachts, including some of the most luxurious in the world.

The Barcelona expansion is the latest development in a period of rapid growth for Armada Engineering, which has seen a string of contract wins since its management buy-out in 2017.

It comes at a time when the global market for luxury yachts has experienced impressive growth. During the past 20 years, the worldwide fleet of yachts above 24 metres in length has almost quadrupled, from 2,000 in 1999 to nearly 8,000 in 2020.

Joff Collins, Armada Engineering’s managing director, said: “In August 2019, Armada Engineering opened a new facility inside MB92 Barcelona, in order to offer an even better service to our key superyacht customers. After just one year of operation, we had begun to outgrow our workshop and started to look for larger facilities to service our growing number of customers.”

Mr Collins added: “We are happy to announce that we are now fully functioning in a new larger workshop inside MB92. This new workshop is part of our strategy to grow this part of our business even further.”