🔒Australian-based defense contractor takes root by CT River in Portland

Driving down Riverview Street in Portland, Connecticut, there is little hint one is heading into the grounds of an international defense contractor.

The narrow road passes modest homes and lines of trees and brush before opening into broad parking lots occupied by trailer-anchored pleasure boats of various sizes. Beyond those are marina buildings on the 31 acres Birdon America acquired along the Connecticut River this spring.

The company is the U.S. arm of Australian-based Birdon Group. It paid roughly $5.2 million for the Riverside Marina, Yankee Boat Yard and Marina and smaller adjacent properties.

Birdon bought the marinas for the East Coast portion of its 10-year contract to refurbish most of the U.S. Coast Guard’s fleet of 47-foot-long rescue boats. The contract is worth up to $203 million.

Birdon has invested another $2 million in sundry building repairs and equipment upgrades, said Birdon America President Robert Scott. Among other things, that includes purchase of a new travel lift, due to arrive in February, that will allow the company to pluck boats — up to 85 feet in length and 120,000 pounds — out of the river.

That will help the company fulfill its Coast Guard contract. It will also allow it to expand into a broader section of the private market.

Birdon plans to spend up to $5.5 million constructing a 25,000-square-foot production building within the next two years. That’s crucial to meeting deadlines on its Coast Guard contract and sets the company up for additional future contracts.

“Ultimately, we wanted to find a place where we could invest and it would be a long-term play for us in terms of investing and being part of a community,” Scott said.

Repairing America’s rescue boats

Birdon began negotiating for the Portland properties following a three-month search that began last November. The company’s target area ranged along the coast from Maine to Virginia.

It needed water access deep enough to receive the Coast Guard’s 47-foot-long motor lifeboats. The tidal waters of the Connecticut River through Portland — about 24 nautical miles from the river’s entry into Long Island Sound — fill that need.

The company is scheduled to overhaul 65 Coast Guard lifeboats in Portland by the close of 2030, along with another 50 in leased facilities in Bellingham, Washington.

So far, the only giveaway that Birdon’s Portland facility is anything more than a marina is a decommissioned Coast Guard rescue boat resting on stands in front of a large, blue, metal-sided industrial building.

Birdon paid $250,000 for the boat, buying it off the private market when it was preparing to bid for the Coast Guard contract. The company spent about $750,000 more tinkering and testing the boat to see what it would take to overhaul.

Before Birdon’s purchase, the blue building behind its test boat was used to store boats. Now, it has been converted into a workspace for rehabbing Coast Guard vessels. Each boat will be stripped and supplied with new engines. Worn-out parts will be replaced.

The first rescue boat was delivered in July. Little squares of tape on the hull mark where corroded aluminum will be cut away and new sections welded in.

It would cost the Coast Guard three or four times as much to design and build a new fleet of rescue boats, Scott said.

The hulls are a tried-and-tested model, able to handle rough seas and even rollovers.

Scott said the Coast Guard will deliver a second boat before the end of this year. Birdon is scheduled to receive six more next year. It is scheduled to refurbish a dozen more in each of the following four years — through 2027 — then trail off toward the end of the contract.

Location, location, location

A few factors played into Birdon’s selection of Portland. Importantly, the marinas offered enough space in the right conditions at the right time.

The Connecticut River also offers enough depth for the smaller to medium-sized ships typically handled by Birdon. Scott said the company is contemplating dredging around the area where it hauls boats in and out of the river.

Birdon was also enamored with Connecticut’s pool of manufacturing laborers, workforce training and a supply chain that already feeds larger defense contractors like Sikorsky Aircraft, Pratt & Whitney and Electric Boat.

“Connecticut’s got a lot to offer,” said Anne Evans, who is working as a strategic advisor to Birdon. “These folks came to the right place for that reason between the workforce development support, the great supply chain and the innovation that goes on here. This is a state that has things up in the sky and underwater. And there’s no place else in the world that does that. So, they can make anything these guys want.”

Evans, a former director with the U.S. Department of Commerce International Trade Administration and a longtime promoter of the state’s manufacturing industry, is helping Birdon navigate Connecticut’s political and business waters.

Among other tasks, she is helping the company connect with area manufacturers, and establish workforce development partnerships.

Building a local workforce

Birdon has so far hired 37 staff to work on the Coast Guard contract in Portland, with plans to increase to 65 employees by the end of 2023, Scott said.

And there could be more to come, depending on responses to additional contract bids Birdon is now pursuing.

While Connecticut has a strong manufacturing tradition and a history of skilled labor, manufacturers are increasingly struggling to fill open positions.

State employers reported 114,000 job openings at the end of August, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. About 11,000 of those jobs were in manufacturing, according to Connecticut Business & Industry Association CEO Chris DiPentima.

Birdon will face competition for talent from another boat maker, submarine manufacturer Electric Boat, which is in the process of hiring thousands of people at its Groton campus as it builds a new fleet of ballistic missile submarines for the U.S. Navy.

Scott notes labor shortages aren’t confined to Connecticut. It’s a challenge that would exist wherever the company locates, he said.

Birdon hopes to establish apprentice programs with Vinal Technical High School, Goodwin University, UConn and others. It is working with the Connecticut Department of Labor to establish apprenticeship opportunities targeted at veterans.

Scott said the company also tries to be a “great place to work,” so employees will recruit friends and family. It offers referral bonuses of $2,000 to $4,000.

Birdon is also maintaining the recreational marina it purchased as part of a promise it made to the property’s former owners, Dean and Kristin Bourbeau. It kept on 14 Yankee Marina staff and has hired six more.

If Birdon is going to be in the marina business, it wants to be the premier family facility in the region, Scott said.

Eastern Australia roots

Birdon got its start in 1977 as a dredging company based in Port Macquarie, on Australia’s east coast. Its founder, truck driver Jim Bruce, started the business with just a couple of deckhands, according to Scott.

The company landed its first major military contract in 1992, refitting troop landing craft for the Australian military. It got its big “breakthrough” in 2003, with a contract for 23 bridge erection propulsion boats for the Australian military. The company expanded to America in 2008, with a contract for 200 bridge erection boats, an order that was later expanded to 491 through a second contract.

Birdon does more than defense contracting. It runs the freight service between mainland Australia and Lord Howe Island. It has a dredging division. It disassembles ships and builds waterjet propulsion units for civilian and military use.

It also designs and builds boats for marine trades and defense applications.

In early October, the company announced it secured a contract worth up to $1.2 billion for the design and construction of up to 27 “waterway commerce cutters” for the U.S. Coast Guard. These are essentially working boats used to maintain buoys and other navigation aids. Those boats, which are up to 180 feet long, will be built in Louisiana, Scott said.

Birdon’s bridge erection boats are built in Denver. There is one tied up in Portland. It’s a drab green, boxy, aluminum boat of nearly eight tons and 24 feet in length. With twin 248-horsepower diesel engines powering waterjets, the boats are designed to drag bridge sections in rivers and hold them in place while troops and equipment cross.

The boat in Portland will be used for research and development, allowing innovations in propulsion and automation to be tested on the water, said Dennis Hancock, a Birdon program director who helps manage the Portland facility.

Able to quickly power up to about 32 mph, turn and stop on a dime, the bridge erection boat is also a powerful marketing tool.

Warm welcome

Portland First Selectmen Ryan J. Curley went for a ride Oct. 21, when he visited the boat yard with members of the town’s Economic Development Commission. Curley said he was already impressed by ongoing property beautification, and the company’s growth plans.

“Ever since they arrived, they have been a wonderful partner with the town,” Curley said. “Every time I’ve been down there, there’s been additional changes, improvements and new employees. They are really hiring some highly-skilled positions.”

Birdon’s proposal for a new production building and a temporary power-washing facility are before local land-use boards, Curley said.

Town officials are also considering adopting new “marine” zoning in that area to help Birdon with future growth, Curley said.

Curley said he hopes to see the company continue to grow its presence and employee rolls in Portland.

“Portland’s history was in shipbuilding and quarrying,” Curley said. “We are very appreciative we can keep the history of Portland shipbuilding alive under this new endeavor and it plays a role not just in Portland’s economy, but also for Middlesex County and the state.”