Marine Industries Global Market Analysis - Marine Institute

126 MARINE INDUSTRIES GLOBAL MARKET ANALYSIS
Major R&D challenges lie ahead, including:
Oil & Gas – Increasing exploitation of gas reserves in light of reducing oil supplies,
increasing oil & gas recovery from brown fields and greater water depths, and
economically developing small fields.
Renewable Energy – Reducing capital costs and improving reliability. Operating
wind farms in deeper waters and at greater distances from the shore. Development of
wave and tidal current power.
Methane Hydrates – We expect increasing efforts to commercially exploit this
potentially large deepwater energy resource. (Significant projects are already underway
in Japan.)
Shipbuilding – How to employ technology to counter high European labour costs
and the threat of China’s penetration of the ‘special vessels’ sector that accounts for
much of Europe’s business.
Marine Biotechnology – This is likely to receive increasing attention as its large
potential is more widely recognised.
Perhaps one long-term concern should be the development of major R&D
capabilities in Asia and the growing power of these countries to ‘undercut’ established
Western centres in attracting commercial R&D funds.We expect countries such as
China, India and Russia to become increasingly competitive due to low labour costs
(a graduate with a master’s degree can be employed in India at 25% of the cost of an
equivalent person in the US).
Offering to undertake R&D in a developing country is often seen as a way for an
incoming company to deliver local content.
A challenge for Western governments will increasingly be how to anchor technology
development in their own countries.