Kockums

The main building

Kockums AB building sign

Kockums AB is a shipyard in Malmö, Sweden owned by the German shipyard Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft (HDW) in Kiel. HDW itself is a subsidiary of the German ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems.

The shipyard formerly possessed a 138 metre high crane, known as the Kockums Crane, built in 1973/1974 and capable of lifting 1500 tons, which was the largest crane in the world when it was installed in 1974. The crane was not used much because of the Swedish shipyard crisis of the late 1970s and 1980s. It was used the last time in 1997 for lifting the foundations of the high pillars of the Oresund Bridge.

The crane was sold the first time in the early 1990s to the Danish company Burmeister & Wain but the company went bankrupt shortly thereafter. It was later sold to Korean company Hyundai Heavy Industries. The crane was a landmark of Malmö from its time of construction until its dismantling to be shipped to Ulsan in South Korea in summer 2002.

Kockums worked with Northrop Grumman and HDW to offer a Visby class corvette derivative in the American Focused Mission Vessel Study, a precursor to the Littoral Combat Ship program. It competed with several other concepts including Norway's Skjold class (part of a Raytheon led group).

Ships built by Kockums

• M/T Frans Suell
• MV Sovetskaya Latviya
• Visby-class of stealth corvettes
• Landsort class mine countermeasures vessel
• Styrsö class mine countermeasures vessel
• Näcken class submarine
• Västergötland class submarine
• Södermanland class submarine
• Gotland class submarine
• HMS Orion (A201)
• Unmanned surface vehicle Piraya

Ships built with Kockums technology

• Collins class submarines
• Archer class submarines (updated Västergötland class)

Future ships

• A26 submarine (replacement of the Södermanlands class submarine)

External links

• Kockums web site
• Pictures of the Kockum crane
• ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems