The Japanese shipbuilding industry is approaching a major turning point. Amid the irreversible global trend toward decarbonization, ships have become more complex than ever before, and the burdens of design and development have increased significantly. At the same time, structural issues faced by the domestic shipbuilding industry, namely a shortage of design engineers and the fragmentation of design resources, are reaching a level that exceeds what individual companies can handle independently. Confronting this reality, NYK is advancing initiatives to support the revitalization of Japanese shipbuilding.

Creating a Design Platform Through an Alliance of Seven Companies

NYK, together with major shipping companies Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha, Ltd. and Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, Ltd., as well as major shipbuilders Mitsubishi Shipbuilding Co., Ltd., Imabari Shipbuilding Co., Ltd., Japan Marine United Corporation (JMU), and Nihon Shipyard Co., Ltd. (NSY), has set out to establish a standard design framework under which common basic designs for next-generation vessels will be developed and rolled out to domestic shipyards. The framework’s targets include liquefied carbon dioxide (LCO2) carriers and new-fuel vessels such as ammonia-fueled vessels. These vessel types will form the main battleground in the decarbonization era.

　At the core of this initiative is MILES Co., Ltd., a joint venture between Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. and Imabari Shipbuilding, formerly known as MI LNG Company, Ltd. NYK, together with the other six companies, has invested in MILES and will build a development and basic design framework centered on this company. Shipping companies as vessel users and shipyards as vessel manufacturers are jointly creating a common design platform. This framework, long discussed in the Japanese maritime industry, has finally come to be.

　NYK has long regarded the restoration of the Japanese shipbuilding industry’s international competitiveness as its own responsibility. President Takaya Soga stated, “We want Japanese shipyards to become even more competitive.” To this end, the company has begun taking action from a shipping company’s perspective.

　The shipbuilding industry is suffering from a manpower shortage in the design stage. While it is essential to create an environment that attracts talent, competitiveness also depends on how efficiently design work can be carried out with a limited number of engineers, and on how rationally the shipbuilding process can be managed. One solution to this challenge is to utilize MILES as the core to consolidate development and basic design of next-generation vessels.

　LCO2 carriers and new-fuel vessels require far more design considerations than conventional commercial vessels, resulting in enormous development and design workloads. In Japan, however, design resources are dispersed among individual companies and are insufficient overall. To overcome this inefficiency, the concept of a “Japanese version of the Shanghai Merchant Ship Design & Research Institute (SDARI)” emerged.

　In China, the established model is that institutes such as SDARI undertake basic design on a centralized basis while shipyards utilize the resulting standardized drawings. In Japan as well, there has been a long-running exploration of a division of labor based on standard basic designs. By having shipping companies and shipbuilders jointly invest in MILES, the company will further strengthen its role as a joint design center for the Japanese maritime cluster.

Toward Collaboration Beyond Industry Boundaries

What is essential is that the maritime transportation companies themselves, as the entities that place orders for vessels, have decided to invest in MILES to accelerate collaboration beyond traditional industry boundaries in Japan. Based on this decision, they will work to promote vessel construction at a wide range of domestic shipyards by utilizing a design framework centered on MILES. To support this, “standardization of specifications” is also being considered.

　President Soga stated, “If standardization can be achieved whereby multiple shipyards build vessels having the same design and multiple shipping companies use those vessels, this will contribute not only to greater efficiency but to addressing labor shortages and the prolongation of construction periods.”

　In 2025, the Japanese government announced support measures aimed at reviving the shipbuilding industry and set a target to restore shipbuilding capacity to 18 million gross tons by 2035. Moreover, investments totaling approximately one trillion yen from both the public and private sectors are taking concrete form. However, merely increasing construction volume will not ensure international competitiveness. Alongside capital investment, it is necessary to change the design approach fundamentally and to deepen collaboration between shipping companies and shipbuilders.

　Initiatives to reform design and development methodologies are also underway. Alongside the University of Tokyo’s research into model-based development through its industry-academia collaborative Maritime and Ocean Digital Engineering Program (MODE Program), the University of Osaka has launched the Open Collaboration Laboratory for Enabling Advanced Marine Systems Program (OCEANS), which applies AI to ship design. Furthermore, development of a simulation platform has begun under the Cabinet Office’s Key and Advanced Technology R&D through the Cross Community Collaboration Program (K Program). These initiatives are led by MTI Co., Ltd., which is responsible for R&D within the NYK Group.

　NYK Chairman Hitoshi Nagasawa has stated, “Restoring the Japanese maritime cluster to be an attractive industry and passing it down to future generations is the responsibility of all of us here today.” Now serving as chairman of the Japanese Shipowners’ Association, he is spreading this vision across the entire industry.

　Government support, capital investment, design innovation, and standardization—NYK, as a vessel user, is supporting the Japanese shipbuilding industry’s efforts to achieve ambitious goals, namely becoming the world’s top market share holder in next-generation vessels by 2030 and restoring construction volume to 18 million gross tons by 2035.

Reedited from the KAIJI PRESS Special Issue published on March 31, 2026