Fincantieri and its cruise shipyards

Fincantieri comprises several shipyards, but each cruise ship can be linked to a specific construction site. Deliveries in 2025 and 2026 provide three examples: Star Princess from Monfalcone, Viking Vesta from Ancona, and Norwegian Luna from Marghera near Venice.

Monfalcone: large Sphere-class ships

On September 26, 2025, Fincantieri delivered Star Princess to Princess Cruises in Monfalcone. She is the second LNG-powered cruise ship in the Sphere class and a sister ship to Sun Princess, also delivered in Monfalcone in 2024. Star Princess measures around 178,000 gross tons and can accommodate about 4,300 people on board. The new ship features a platform with systems designed to improve energy efficiency. Sun Princess and Star Princess demonstrate the important role Monfalcone plays in building large ocean-going cruise ships: it is Fincantieri’s largest cruise ship production site, and more than 40 ships had been delivered there between 1990 and September 2025.

Ancona: smaller ocean-going ships and new propulsion systems

Viking Vesta was delivered to Viking at the Ancona shipyard on June 26, 2025. According to Fincantieri, the ship belongs to the smaller cruise ship segment. It measures around 54,300 gross tons, has 499 cabins, and can accommodate 998 passengers. This puts it in a different size category from the Sphere-class ships built in Monfalcone. Ancona is also the site of a newbuild project involving alternative propulsion systems: in June 2025, Viking Libra and her sister ship Viking Astrea were under construction there. Libra was scheduled for delivery at the end of 2026, and Astrea in 2027. Fincantieri described Libra as the first cruise ship intended to use hydrogen stored on board for both propulsion and power generation.

Marghera: new ships for Norwegian Cruise Line

In 2026, Norwegian Luna was delivered to Norwegian Cruise Line in Marghera, near Venice. She is the second ship in the extended Prima Plus class that Fincantieri is building for the cruise line. Fincantieri as a corporate group, its individual shipyards, and a shipowner such as Viking or a cruise line such as Princess Cruises each have different roles.

Understanding the group and the shipyard

For newbuilds, “Fincantieri” refers to the shipbuilding group; Monfalcone, Ancona, and Marghera name individual sites.

The overview Shipyards in cruise shipbuilding covers other shipbuilders. Ship sections, shipyard construction, and undocking explains how the hull, sections, and equipment come together in a newbuild. Building shipyards, repair yards, and refits describes the difference between newbuilds and subsequent modernizations.