The company Harland and Wolff was formed in the year 1861, by Gustav Wilhelm Wolff, born in Hamburg in 1834, together with Mr. Edward James Harland born in 1831. During the year 1858 the general manager at the time, Harland, purchased the small shipyard on Queen's Island. He purchased the property from his employer, Richard Hickson.
Harland at one time purchased Hickson's shipyard and made his assistant Wolff a partner in the company. Gustav Wolff was Gustav Schwabe of Hamburg's nephew. He has invested mainly in the Bibby Line. The initial 3 ships that the brand new shipyard constructed were for that line. By being inventive, Harland made the business a successful undertaking. Among his well-known ideas was increasing the overall strength of the ship by using iron for the upper wodden decks. As well, he was able to increase the capacity of the ship by giving the hulls a squarer cross section and a flatter bottom.
Harland and Wolff were eventually faced with competitive pressures in regards to shipbuilding. They sought to broaden their portfolio and shift their focus. They decided to focus less on building ships and more on structural engineering and design. The business even diversified into the areas of ship repair, offshore construction projects as well as competing for additional projects which had to do with metal engineering or construction.
These other interests led to Harland and Wolff building a series of bridges in Britain and in the Republic of Ireland. These bridges consist of the restoration of both Dublin's Ha'penny Bridge and the James Joyce Bridge. In the 1980s, their initial venture into the civil engineering sector occurred with the construction of the Foyle Bridge.
The MV Anvil Point was the last shipbuilding project of Harland and Wolff to date. This was among six near identical Point class sealift ships which was built to be utilized by the Ministry of Defense. During 2003, the ship was launched, after being built under license from Flensburger, Schiffbau-Gesellschaft, German shipbuilders.