BORN-again shipbuilder Swan Hunter could start 2001 as it ended last year, with a number of potential new contracts in the pipeline.

The company is expected to begin talks in the next few months with at least three overseas governments, impressed with the firm's new ship designs.

The development follows last month's agreement between Tyneside-based Swans and the Ministry of Defence (MoD) for two of its new generation of alternative landing ships logistic (ALSL) vessels.

Government minister Baroness Symons was at the yard to set the seal on the £140m MoD contract for the 16,000-tonne warships.

The Minister of State for Defence Procurement ran the rule over the Swan Hunter shipyard in Wallsend, where the order will help secure up to 2,000 jobs.

The order for the vessels will end a six-year wait for shipbuilding to return to the Tyne, and at the time it was thought the deal would put the yard in line for future warship orders from the MoD.

But interest has stretched beyond these shores with two European and one Asian Government following up with inquiries about potential contracts.

Commercial director at Swans, Norman Brownell, said: "We've had at least three foreign Governments expressing an interest in our ALSLs.

"What exactly this entails we do not know at present, and we won't know until later this year.

"The possibilities could mean building in Wallsend for those countries who don't have the shipyards, or those countries building to our design. But at the moment it is just an initial interest."

One of the governments has expressed interest in Swans building an entire vessel larger than the ALSLs. If the deal, worth around £75m, were clinched it would be the first ship built for an overseas government by Swans for 30 years.

The last warship built on the Tyne was HMS Richmond, launched from Swans in 1994