Leading Pacific Northwest shipbuilder acquired by East Coast investor

The Pacific Northwest shipbuilding and defense engineering firm Vigor Industrial, which employs 2,300 including 410 workers in Seattle, will be acquired by East Coast investment firm Carlyle Group and merged with a Virginia maritime company, Carlyle announced Thursday.

Carlyle did not disclose financial details of the transaction, but the acquisition was a result of a recapitalization process to buy out Vigor investors, a Vigor spokesperson said. Vigor will combine with Virginia-based shipbuilder MHI Holdings.

Vigor said it does not anticipate changes to its Washington operations.

Since buying Portland-based Cascade General shipyard in 1995, Vigor has scooped up a number of small- and medium-sized shipbuilding and engineering interests in the Puget Sound area, including Seattle’s century-old Todd Shipyards for $130 million in 2011.

The company is now a major player in the Pacific Northwest, building Washington state ferries and landing craft for the U.S. Army.

Vigor’s shipyards are the only ones in the region able to build large commercial and military vessels, said Peter Philips, the publisher of Pacific Maritime Magazine, an industry publication in Seattle, making the company “really important to the health of the Pacific Northwest maritime industry.”

In February, the company opened a new 400-person plant in Vancouver, Washington, to service its $1 billion Army contract for the landing craft. Vigor also operates facilities in Seattle and Port Angeles, as well as Oregon and Alaska.

The Carlyle Group is a global investment firm with $222 billion in assets across six continents.