History

Southampton Marine Services Ltd, or The SMS Group, as we are known, is a young company with a proud history; uniting well-known commercial shipping professionals from Southampton Marine Services, Burgess Marine, Testbank Ship Repair and Small & Co. We are the pinnacle of a near 60 year evolution of some of the UK’s finest ship repair, refit and marine engineering names.

Much has changed in those sixty years, but to this day, our commitment to delivering engineering excellence has not. Today we are a multi-disciplined marine engineering services provider operating in the commercial marine, cruise and defence sectors of the ever growing UK and international maritime industry. The last decade has seen a significant increase in the scale of our operations, with such growth including geographical expansion from one trading location to eight. We are the UK’s largest independent ship repairer and a premier provider of marine engineering services.

The SMS family is made up of qualified professionals and highly skilled tradespeople to collaborate on projects large and small, ranging from naval architects and engineers to carpenters and apprentices, together we work with the guiding principles of personalisation and a can-do attitude. From the North Sea coast of Suffolk south through the English channel to Lands’ End, we have a number of ship repair and refit facilities ideally located to support the UK’s largest ports, naval bases and busy shipping lanes.

Furthermore, the surrounding seas are no barrier to our global support projection. From small scale engineering assistance via the supply of skilled labour, to fully project managed, resourced and delivered refits in third party overseas shipyards, we are the international partner of choice for many ship operators, owners and managers. We strive to offer our customers a total service solution for all their marine engineering challenges; the nature of the industry within which we operate means our technical teams are available on a planned or emergency basis 24hrs a day, 365 days a year. We are ship repair and refit experts, we are marine engineers, we are The SMS Group.