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BOATBUILDING & DESIGN ultimate workboat by any de? nition.

Obviously, with that track record, it’s no wonder the company is trust- ed worldwide due to its proven hull form(s) and the ability to quickly and competently build a series for a certain size vessel and a wide variation of hulls on spec that can be fully customized and full support services.

“We have 800 to 1,000 naval ar- chitects, engineers on our payroll,” says van Hogerwou. “They do noth- ing else but design ships and make speci? c custom requested changes to these designs. So we go from absolute 100 percent standard design vessels to 100 percent custom designed and ev- erything in between.”

Getting off to a fast start with these new contracts, van Hogerwou is clear- ly very optimistic. Over time, he ex- pects the Houston commercial of? ce to grow in size with sales, support and technical staff, but at the same time, will stay small enough to comfortably support its market. “We’ve always been convinced that we needed to be close to our customers,” he says. “Now we’re in the same time zone. They can reach Damen literally 24/7.”

Damen designs are familiar, iconic, and widely used on this side of the pond already. The new of? ce, opened during an unquestionably dif? cult market, is off to a fast start. With tugs representing Damen’s bread and but- ter globally, the future looks bright for

Damen in North America, and the presence of its of? ce in this market means more work for U.S. shipyards.

Stop Abrasion Now.

And that can’t be a bad thing.

Leading The Way For A Quarter of a Century (ARD