During this time the majority of its shares were owned by the United Kingdom firm (John Brown and Vickers-Armstrong[1]), and therefore almost all ships built by the company were developed after Royal Navy designs.
[12] For a period of sixteen years, all the technicians were exclusively British, and the situation was not altered till 1925 when the management was taken over by Spanish engineers, as one of the new policies introduced by the then newly created government, including ministers both civil and military, of the dictator Miguel Primo de Rivera[13] (1923–1930).
[14] In sight of the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, and because there was fear of social unrest in the naval station, the Foreign Office in London,[15][16] organized a ship to repatriate all the remaining British citizens and on 22 July 1936 HMS Witch (D89)[17] departed from Ferrol back to Britain.
Many British technical advisors continued to work in the Spanish shipbuilding yards, workshops, foundries and dry docks (on both sides) during the war.
[18] Between 1958 and 1960, SECN built 23 electric railcars and 12 trailers for use on metre gauge railways operated by FEVE.