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Vigor Marine Group

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Vigor Marine Group

Vigor Marine Group, formerly Vigor Industrial, is an American shipbuilding, ship repair, and marine service company based in Portland, Oregon. Vigor operates shipyards in Oregon, Washington, California, and Virginia, with a combined total of 2,500 employees as of 2025.

Vigor grew out of Cascade General, a ship repair company that began operating at the Port of Portland's Swan Island shipyard in 1987. Cascade General purchased the shipyard from the Port of Portland in 2000 and established the name Vigor Industrial. Vigor continued operating as a repair yard for several years before establishing the barge-building company U.S. Barge in 2006 as a joint venture with Oregon Iron Works.

Vigor Industrial expanded throughout the 2010s, acquiring companies such as Todd Shipyards, Alaska Ship and Drydock, Oregon Iron Works, and Kvichak Marine Industries. Vigor recapitalized in 2019 after being acquired by a pair of private equity firms, which created Titan Acquisition Holdings as Vigor's new parent company. In 2025, Vigor Industrial consolidated with other companies under the ownership of Titan Acquisition Holdings to form the Vigor Marine Group.

In 1942, what is now Vigor's Swan Island facility in Portland began operations as the Kaiser Company's Swan Island Shipyard. After the end of World War II, the Swan Island shipyard was purchased by the Port of Portland, which operated it as a repair yard. The Port leased space at the yard to various ship repair contractors, including Cascade General, which began operating there in 1987.

Due to a downturn in the ship repair market in the 1990s, the other companies operating at the Swan Island yard went out of business, leaving Cascade General as the only remaining contractor by 1994. Concerned about the string of failed companies, port commissioners decided in late 1994 to shift the shipyard to a single-operator arrangement and began a bidding process to find a company to manage the yard.

Businessmen Frank Foti and Andrew Rowe bought Cascade General in March 1995, with Foti becoming CEO; the company had no ship repair contracts at the time of purchase, and it was uncertain whether it would be able to continue operations. Despite the company's precarious financial situation, Foti and Rowe submitted a bid to become the exclusive operator of the Swan Island yard, which they ultimately secured in May 1995. The contract granted them control over the yard for five years at a rate of $5.8 million per year. Cascade General was able to secure repair work on a number of vessels in the following years and established better financial footing. By 1997, the company had sales of $132 million and a workforce of 1,200.

In 1998, Foti also purchased Washington Marine Repair in Port Angeles, Washington.

In 1997–98, Cascade General engaged in negotiations with the Port of Portland about purchasing the Swan Island shipyard. After securing funding from the British shipbuilding company Cammell Laird and other lenders, Cascade General purchased the Swan Island facility from the Port of Portland in 2000 at a cost of $30.8 million. The company established the name Vigor Industrial the same year. The sale included 57 acres (23 ha) of land, cranes, dry docks, and other equipment.

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