Hanwha Ocean ended Monday up 7.3 percent at 114,700 won after surging as much as 15 percent earlier while the benchmark KOSPI remained in negative territory, on expectations that its name will be called out by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney when he announces the preferred bidder later Monday local time, or early Tuesday in Korea.
As of Monday afternoon in Seoul, Hanwha Ocean said it had yet to receive any formal notification and was awaiting the government's announcement.
Canada is expected to name the preferred bidder for its 12-submarine procurement program on Monday local time, bringing nearly a year of competition between South Korea's Hanwha Ocean and Germany's Thyssenkrupp Marine Systems (TKMS) to a decisive stage.
The Canadian Patrol Submarine Project, estimated by South Korean industry officials to be worth up to 60 trillion won ($40 billion) including long-term maintenance and operational support, would rank among the largest conventional submarine contracts ever awarded.
Carney is scheduled to make the announcement during a stop in Halifax before departing for the NATO summit in Türkiye. He is expected to identify a preferred bidder rather than immediately award the contract, with detailed negotiations likely to continue afterward.
Canada launched the acquisition process in July 2024 and narrowed the competition in August 2025 to Hanwha Ocean's KSS-III Batch-II submarine and TKMS's Type 212CD, jointly backed by Germany and Norway.
Despite months of public campaigning by both sides, the outcome remained closely guarded through the final weekend, with officials in Seoul and Berlin offering sharply contrasting signals.
Germany mounted an aggressive final push. During a visit to TKMS's Wismar shipyard on Friday, German Vice Chancellor and Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil said the entire federal government was campaigning for closer defense cooperation with Canada.
"The arguments are really on our side," Klingbeil said, citing Germany's production quality, industrial capacity and NATO interoperability. TKMS Chief Executive Oliver Burkhard also said the company remained confident of winning the contract.
While Klingbeil stopped short of claiming the Type 212CD was technically superior to Hanwha Ocean's submarine, his remarks underscored Berlin's confidence that Germany's status as a core NATO ally and its longstanding defense relationship with Canada could strengthen TKMS's bid.
Seoul, by contrast, remained measured.
Kang Hoon-sik, South Korea's presidential chief of staff, last week described the race as "about 50-50," saying both contenders had clear strengths. He said Canada would have to weigh Germany's NATO ties and submarine expertise against South Korea's faster delivery schedule and broader industrial cooperation package.
Kang added that South Korea had submitted a realistic proposal it was fully confident it could deliver.
A column published Sunday by the Toronto Sun raised the possibility of a divided award, although Carney has previously argued that the operational efficiencies of maintaining a single submarine class would be "overwhelming." A split fleet could ease production risks but would also require separate training, maintenance, spare-parts inventories and logistics systems.
It would also complicate the industrial benefits pledged by both bidders. Hanwha Ocean has proposed more than C$70 billion in trade and investment in Canada, while the German-Norwegian consortium has said its proposal would contribute C$86 billion to the Canadian economy and create more than 650,000 job-years.
Because those economic packages were designed around securing the broader submarine program, a split award would likely require Ottawa to renegotiate which investments, jobs and Canadian partnerships remain attached to each supplier. Many of those commitments are currently contained in memorandums of understanding and would need to be converted into binding contractual obligations during the next stage of negotiations.
Monday’s announcement should reveal which side will enter the next stage of negotiations. But even for the nominal winner, it will mark the beginning of a lengthy contracting process rather than the final award.
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