Dutch shipbuilding group, IHC Merwede, plans to set up a facility in India to manufacture dredging equipment.

"We are planning to set up an unit in India in the next few years as the Indian maritime industry is growing," IHC Merwede Dredging and Mining, Area Manager for India, Philip De Bats, told media here.

Presently, IHC Merwede, the largest global player in dredging and off-shore work, supplies both small and large dredges to India from its Netherland units for over a decade.

The company also signed an MoU with Cochin Shipyard last Friday for future collaboration on dredging and off-shore activities in the country.

However, De Bats refused to divulge the investment the company is likely to make in this regard.

"We can't reveal the figure right now but the number would be huge as a dredge costs somewhere between USD 1.5-350 million (depending on their size)," Bats said.

The company, with a global market

share of 60 per cent in the dredging and off-shore work business, will also open another regional headquarter in Mumbai in a bid to boost its presence and service offerings in the Indian sub-continent.

It already has its office in Delhi for the last over 25 years and is doing business in the country for the last eight decades.

"We are the main supplier to Dredging Corporation of India, supplying around 90 per cent of its fleet but in the past five-years the private sector here is booming and the demand for spare parts and new services has increased dramatically." he said.