LS Marine Solution has completed a major performance upgrade of its submarine cable-laying vessel GL2030 and is accelerating its push into domestic and overseas subsea power infrastructure markets. The move is a strategy to meet surging demand for submarine cable installation as offshore wind expansion and high-voltage direct current (HVDC) construction gain momentum.
LS (006260) Marine Solution said on the 22nd that it has completed modification work expanding the cable loading capacity of the GL2030 from the existing 4,000 tons to the 7,000-ton class.
With this upgrade, the GL2030 can now transport and lay more submarine cable in a single voyage. In particular, continuous construction of long-distance sections exceeding 100 kilometers has become possible, which is expected to reduce the number of voyages and cut construction time and costs.
A submarine cable-laying vessel is a core facility for installing power and communication cables on the seabed, and its loading capacity and construction capability determine a project's competitiveness. Through this GL2030 upgrade, LS Marine Solution plans to further strengthen its capacity to carry out large offshore wind farm and HVDC projects.
The market outlook is also bright. The government has announced plans to auction a total of 55 gigawatts of offshore wind capacity by 2035 and is also pursuing large-scale national power grid projects such as the West Coast HVDC energy highway. As demand for building cross-border submarine communication networks grows amid the spread of AI data centers, the subsea power and communication cable market is rapidly expanding.
LS Marine Solution is also working to strengthen the competitiveness of its vessels tailored to sea conditions and project scale. The GL2030 is a vessel optimized for construction in shallow coastal waters. In addition, when a next-generation submarine cable-laying vessel of the 13,000-ton class, currently under construction, is deployed, the company will have a "two-track" construction system capable of handling even long-distance, large-capacity projects.
LS Marine Solution has already won orders for the Jeju submarine No. 2 and No. 3 interconnection projects and the Korea-Japan submarine communication network (JAKO) project pursued by Microsoft and Amazon, demonstrating its submarine cable installation capabilities. Additional orders are also expected as a result.
"We will expand our participation in core national power grid projects such as the West Coast HVDC energy highway, and based on LS Cable & System's U.S. submarine cable production base LS GreenLink, we will also begin in earnest to tap global markets including the United States and Europe," an LS Marine Solution official said.
