South Korea’s world-leading shipbuilding groups are moving deeper into new businesses to weather the worst shipping slump in 25 years.

Many of South Korea’s small shipbuilders and Chinese rivals have gone under amid a fall-off in demand for container ships and dry bulk carriers. However, Hyundai Heavy Industries, Samsung, and Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering – the world’s three biggest shipbuilders, controlling about 40 per cent of the global market – are in relatively good shape, shielded by revenues from more resilient oil and gas-related vessels.

Global ship orders dropped 53 per cent in the first nine months of this year amid oversupply. But Korean companies have fared better than Chinese and Japanese rivals as they continued to win orders for higher-margin oil drilling ships, liquefied natural gas carriers and offshore oil production facilities. South Korea won new orders worth $18.9bn, compared with China’s $10.2bn and Japan’s $2.8bn, according to the shipbroker Clarkson.