The chance that Damen Shipyards, the largest shipyard in the Netherlands, will land a €3.5bn order to build four advanced frigates for the German navy has increased significantly, the Financieele Dagblad reported on Friday.

Earlier this week, the Gorinchem-based shipbuilder was one of three yards in the running for the MKS 180 frigates, the paper said.

But on Thursday afternoon the German business paper Handelsblatt said one of the other contenders, the ‘ultra-German’ consortium made up of  ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems and Bremen-based shipyard Lürssen, had dropped out of the bidding. According to Handelsblatt the German government doubted that ThyssenKrupp and Larsen had the technical capacity to build the ships.

The move automatically increased Damen’s chances to win the order for the multi-purpose combat ships. Damen is working on the project with Hamburg shipyard Blohm + Voss.

In addition to Damen, German Naval Yards of Keil, working with Britain’s BAE Systems, is in the running. GNY is owned by French-Lebanese businessman Iskandar Safa.

The order calls for four frigates wth an option on a further two. It is the German navy’s largest order for some time.