Simply Abu Dhabi XXVII

6 4 S I M P LY A B U DH A B I The designs that have been started without an owner are mostly ground-breaking. Do they set the DNA for Oceanco? The DNA of Oceanco is innovative. The designs are impressive and the quality of the build is very good. We have a very innovative sailing yacht which is under construction right now, the 106-metre Solar. The owner is trying out a lot of new ideas. Solar is going to be a beautiful yacht. She is one-of-a- kind with a number of new innovative technologies, which has never been used in yachts before. It’s good to have innovative owners that want to drive the industry forward. In 2015, you invested in Turquoise Yachts. How did that start? I knew Mehmet Karabeyoglu and his partner for a long time. In 2014, Mehmet said to me, “Why don’t you invest in this company?” It’s a good investment, Turkey is growing as a country and the company gets a lot of interest from the Middle East – and the boats keep their prices very well in the second-hand market. We recently built two yachts with Turquoise – the 47m Razan which was delivered earlier this year, and a 77m due for delivery in 2018 – and we have plans for more. Turquoise has excellent facilities which rival many of the top yacht builders. They can build up to six yachts at the same time. We don’t want to go above 80m with Turquoise because once you get to that size the construction complications are greater and the risks become more complex. We would like to stay at a happy medium of 45m to 80m. The large yacht market has been driven by clients from Eastern Europe, Russia and the Middle East. With the Russian sanctions, do you think that the 80m-plus market will suffer? I thought so, but what I actually see is that the American market is picking up, and today the yachting industry is very much driven by the American market. The Middle East, especially Middle Eastern royalty, are big drivers of the large yacht market and that will continue. The American market is healthy and I also think there is a strong market in India. We are also receiving enquiries for large yachts from new markets like Asia, Latin America and Africa. What could be done better in the yachting industry? A shipyard sells a yacht and after the warranty period has concluded, often the client and yacht are forgotten. If you look at Oceanco, we see the client as a client for a lifetime. We take care of all of them, even if they has a 25- year-old Oceanco.