BEIRUT — Turkish defense firm Desan is expanding its reach in Southeast Asia with plans to construct its first overseas shipyard in Malaysia.
The firm said on social media on Monday that it signed a Joint Venture and Cooperation Agreement last week with SM-WEZ (Straits of Melaka Waterfront Economic Zone region), a local partner owned by the State of Malacca, to build a shipyard there.
“We officially launched this significant collaboration at a ceremony held in Istanbul on January 8th,” the firm said, highlighting that the shipyard will be dedicated to “new shipbuilding, maintenance, repair, and modernization activities for military and commercial vessels.”
Construction of the shipyard will be launched early this year, and the company expects and it will become operational in two years over a total area of 171 acres.
This is not the first cooperative project between Desan and Malaysia, as the Turkish firm is building a Multi-Purpose Coast Guard Vessel (MPMS-1) for the Malaysian Coast Guard Command and last week signed an agreement to build a second vessel of the same type, MPMS-2.
The Turkish firm will equip the vessel with sensors, weapons, communication systems, and unmanned surface vessels (USV) as part of the project.
“This is undoubtedly a transformative milestone for both the company and Malaysia,” defense analyst and professor at Qatar University Ali Bakir told Breaking Defense. “It marks a significant transition for the company as it moves from the domestic market to the international arena, highlighting its riding role in the maritime domain.”
He expected “this investment, along with other similar ones in the aerial and maritime domains, will strengthen cooperation between the Turkish and Malaysian defense industries in unprecedented ways and will have a positive spillover effect alongside the other defense agreements between Turkish defense companies and Muslim nations in Southeast Asia.”
Bakir added that for some time now Turkey has been pursuing defense cooperation agreements with Muslim nations in Southeast Asia to gain access to these markets.
“Given the short timeframe in which this goal was achieved, it represents a significant success for Ankara and is poised to revolutionize its defense ties with these nations,” he said. “The Turkish defense industry openness is particularly attractive to these countries, not only due to the advantages of partnering with Ankara — such as relatively affordable defense equipment and highly effective platform — but also because of the options for technology transfer that could transform the defense sector in major Muslim nations.”
Bakir concluded that the US-Chinese competition and Western and Chinese restrictions on defense products make “defense solutions” from a third party “even more appealing to these nations.”