Monaco/Turku, 30^th January 2007: Deltamarin, the leading global naval architecture and marine engineering group and V.Ships Leisure, the leading provider of third party ship management and related services to the passenger shipping industry, have formed a joint venture company, V.Delta. The new company will provide safe, efficient, cost and time effective conversion solutions to cruise ships, ferries and mega-yachts.

V.Delta (www.vdelta.net) will be a one-stop-shop in ship conversions. Its portfolio will range from feasibility studies to turn-key projects whereby clients are provided with a full range of services including project management, engineering, procurement, construction supervision, logistics and other related services. This spectrum is based on the combined ship lifecycle experience of its founding shareholders. The extensive joint track record in the field of passenger vessel new buildings and conversions is exploited to generate innovative and unique overall solutions to the clients worldwide.

V.Delta will combine Deltamarin’s engineering and V.Ships’ operational expertise and benefit from the global network of its parent companies. 

V.Delta’s core market, the cruise, ferry and mega yacht sectors, is expected to generate even greater demand for increasingly complex ship upgrading, conversion, lengthening and other projects in the future.

The two shareholders have already worked together and have a number of bids for projects currently out in the market. Initially, Jarmo Valtonen from Deltamarin and Matteo Di Maio from V.Ships Leisure will be dedicated to develop V.Delta to serve the clients with customized solutions.  

Jukka Laiterä, Chairman of Deltamarin, says: “Thorough engineering know-how of Deltamarin combined with the unparalleled operation, conversion and newbuilding supervision experience of V.Ships, will offer the passenger shipping industry a unique alternative for future upgrading/conversion projects”.  

Lorenzo Malvarosa, Chief Executive Officer, V.Ships Leisure comments: “We are delighted to enter a joint venture with Deltamarin which will help to expand the portfolio of services offered already by V.Ships Leisure”.  

Deltamarin (www.deltamarin.com) Group operates worldwide and covers the entire field of engineering from feasibility studies and concept development up to complete engineering and contracting packages, including management services and on-site supervision. The Group is owned 100% by the management shareholders. Together with affiliated companies and a partner network, the Deltamarin Group deploys approximately 500 engineers and consultants. 

V.Ships Leisure is the passenger ship management arm of V.Ships (www.vships.com), the largest business unit within the V.Holdings group of companies. V.Ships is the world’s largest provider of ship management services to a fleet of over 900 vessels encompassing most ship types. It is an international company with 68 offices located in 26 countries employing 1,600 office and 24,000 sea-going staff. V.Ships Leisure is the leading provider of third party management services to the cruise, ferry and yacht industries. The current ownership structure of V.Holdings is 50/50 Close Brothers Private Equity and more than 100 of its directors.

Contact:

Deltamarin

Jukka Laiterä

Tel: +358 2 4336 300

Email: jukka.laitera (at) deltamarin.com

V.Ships Group

Lorenzo Malvarosa

Tel: +377 92 05 10 50

Email: Lorenzo.malvarosa (at) vships.com

MTI Network

Patrick Adamson, MTI Network

Tel: +44 207 823 9444

Email: Pat.Adamson (at) mtinetwork.com