Oil rigs and vessels used in off-shore exploration have been a recent mainstay of the company.

The shipyard was once a flagship company

However, the yard has not been without controversy over the years.

At one time the workforce was overwhelmingly Protestant and even though some Catholics worked there, others felt it exemplified loyalist domination.

In recent years the UK Government has invested billions of pounds to keep the company afloat because of its central place in the Northern Ireland economy.

Earlier this year the yard issued redundancy notices to its entire workforce - but in reality its future has been under threat for some time.

Court case

In April 1999 it announced profits of �5m with a focus on building equipment for the oil exploration industry.

But just a few months later a dispute emerged with its only customer, US firm Global Marine, over who was responsible for covering the cost of extra work carried out on two vessels.

A recent court decision allowed Global Marine to take away a drill ship without making a final payment of �23m.

Harland and Wolff had said that the vessel was ready for delivery, but Global Marine refused to accept the ship and said it was not completed to their satisfaction.

The two companies are also involved in an ongoing row over a contract dispute involving nearly �100m. The dispute is to be settled by arbitration - but in the meantime the yard is running out of money.

Lost contracts

At the end of 1999 the former trade and enterprise minister, Sir Reg Empey, announced a �2.7m aid package to help the company win new orders.

But in March the company lost a �400m order to build the new Queen Mary II, a super liner planned by American cruise company Cunard.

Another major contract on which it was bidding went to a Korean shipyard while other Ministry of Defence contracts the firm hoped to win, may be several years away.

As a result the core shipbuilding workforce was cut to 1,000 through the redundancy of hundreds of workers Those remaining are now on a two- or three-day week.

In May the gloom lifted briefly with the signing of a �300m contract with a Norwegian firm to build four advanced roll-on-roll-off passenger vessels.

The yard also announced that it hoped to sign a contract with the Miami-based compnay Luxus to build two new luxery liners.

Redundancies expected

But by July Harland and Wolff's parent company Olsen Energy announced record losses of about �8m for the second quarter of the year, most of which it attributed to the shipyard.

Another major round of redundancies looks unavoidable as the company says it has no work to offer its employees until the new contracts begin.

Strangely, the doomed Titantic could be one element that helps the yard to survive.

South African millionnaire Sarel Gous has held talks with Harland and Wolff this summer about building a new version of the ill-fated liner.

He is said to be very committed to the �500m project, although no plans have been confirmed.