During 1861, the company Harland and Wolff was formed. Mr. Gustav Wilhelm Wolff, born within Hamburg in the year 1834, along with Mr. Edward James Harland born during 1831, formed the business. In 1858 Harland, who was the general manager at the time, purchased the small shipyard on Queen's Island. He purchased the property from Robert Hickson, who was his employer.
Harland at one time bought Hickson's shipyard and made his assistant Wolff a partner in the business. Gustav Wolff was Gustav Schwabe of Hamburg's nephew. He has invested heavily in the Bibby Line. The initial 3 ships which were built by the brand new shipyard were for that line. By being innovative, Harland made the business a successful venture. One of his well-known suggestions was increasing the overall strength of the ship by replacing the upper wooden decks with iron ones. Moreover, 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 building ships. They sought to shift their focus and broaden their portfolio. They decided to focus more on structural design and engineering and less on building ships. The company even diversified into the areas of offshore construction projects, ship repair and competing for more projects that had to do with construction and metal engineering.
Harland and Wolff had other interests, such as a series of bridges to be built in Britain and in the Republic of Ireland. These bridges consist of the restoration of both the James Joyce Bridge and Dublin's Ha'penny Bridge. During the 1980s, their initial foray into the civil engineering sector took place with the building of the Foyle Bridge.
The MV Anvil Point was the last shipbuilding project of Harland and Wolff to date. This was one of six near identical Point class sealift ships that was constructed to be used by the Ministry of Defense. The ship was launched in 2003, after being constructed under license from Flensburger, Schiffbau-Gesellschaft, German shipbuilders.