Lloyd Werft in Bremerhaven sold to the Rönner-Zech Group
Created: 03/05/2022Updated: 03/05/2022 14:32
The Bremerhaven Lloyd shipyard.
© Sina Schuldt/dpa/archive image
For many weeks, the employees at the Bremerhaven Lloyd shipyard feared for their jobs.
Now they can breathe easy.
The company has been sold and bankruptcy is to be averted.
Bremerhaven - The Bremerhaven Lloyd shipyard has been sold to the Rönner-Zech Group.
As lawyer Christoph Morgen announced on Saturday, the purchase contract was signed late on Friday evening.
Morgen is the insolvency administrator of the parent company MV Werften in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.
"For two days we conducted intensive negotiations with different bidders," it said.
“Both concepts were presented to us in detail.
In the end, the Rönner-Zech Group was awarded the contract.” The new owners are the Bremen contractor Kurt Zech and the Bremerhaven steel and shipbuilder Thorsten Rönner.
The Federal Cartel Office still has to approve the purchase, which is expected in the near future.
In the wake of the MV shipyards in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, the traditional Lloyd shipyard in Bremerhaven also filed for bankruptcy in January.
Both companies belonged to the Hong Kong conglomerate Genting.
Its cruise division was in trouble because of the pandemic.
The Lloyd shipyard has around 230 employees.
In addition to the insolvent operating company Lloyd Werft Bremerhaven, the Rönner-Zech Group also took over the non-insolvent holding company Lloyd Investment and Management Company, Morgen said.
The aim is to withdraw the bankruptcy application.
In this way, all creditors would get their money and the employees of the shipyard would keep their employment relationships unchanged.
According to the restructuring experts Morgen, the Rönner-Zech Group has agreed to present a business plan.
If an auditor confirms, based on the plan, that the yard has a future perspective, bankruptcy can be averted.
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The lawyer pointed out that there were several interested parties for the company.
“There was a lot of interest, the wrangling over the shipyard lasted until the very end,” he said.
The ship and yacht builder Al Seer Marine from the Arab Emirate of Abu Dhabi had expressed its interest in buying.
Bremen politicians had campaigned for a regional solution.
Morgen did not want to give any details about the concept of the Rönner-Zech Group, the new owners should do that themselves.
In principle, it is planned to continue using the shipyard for ship repairs and conversions.
Free areas should therefore be used for work in the steel construction sector, for example.
Union representatives called for a long-term perspective for employees.
The industrial and shipyard jobs must be preserved in the long term and on collective terms, said Doreen Arnold from IG Metall Weser-Elbe.
The employees of the shipyard were informed in writing shortly after the signing of the purchase contract, and a works meeting is planned for Monday afternoon.
dpa