{"id":31375,"date":"2025-11-03T15:50:15","date_gmt":"2025-11-03T15:50:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/31375\/"},"modified":"2025-11-03T15:50:15","modified_gmt":"2025-11-03T15:50:15","slug":"young-us-tech-billionaires-cant-resist-luxury-yachts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/31375\/","title":{"rendered":"Young US tech billionaires can\u2019t resist luxury yachts"},"content":{"rendered":"

The air of Fort Lauderdale, on Florida\u2019s southeastern coast, is filled with the sound of Lamborghini and Rolls-Royce engines. Along a stretch of the waterfront known as \u201cMillionaire\u2019s Row\u201d, mansions are being knocked down and redeveloped into more palatial properties, while Aston Martin has strategically parked a Vanquish sports car within plain sight of the passing yachts.<\/p>\n

European luxury brands descended on the city last week as tens of thousands of yacht enthusiasts surveyed about 1,000 vessels at the annual Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show, which claims to be the world\u2019s largest event of its kind and is seen as a barometer for the global luxury sector.<\/p>\n

Massimo Perotti, 65, chairman and chief executive of Sanlorenzo, the luxury Italian yachtmaker, opened a new American headquarters at Pier Sixty-Six, a marina in Fort Lauderdale on Thursday, as the company positions itself to cater to America\u2019s growing class of billionaire entrepreneurs<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Massimo<\/p>\n

Massimo Perotti<\/p>\n

JOSH RITCHIE FOR THE TIMES<\/p>\n

\u201cOur customers are mainly entrepreneurs,\u201d Perotti said in an interview at the new headquarters. \u201cMore and more are younger and coming from high tech, which is producing a lot of wealth.\u201d<\/p>\n

America\u2019s ultra-wealthy have benefited from surging stock markets and the generative artificial intelligence boom. Last year about a third, or 1,135, of the world\u2019s billionaires were in the US and their combined wealth was $5.7 trillion, or 43 per cent of global billionaire wealth, according to Altrata, a wealth-intelligence firm. <\/p>\n

Luxury brands are seeing an opportunity. In the first half of 2025, the Americas accounted for \u20ac95.3 million in new yacht revenues at Sanlorenzo, up 38.6 per cent year-on-year and representing over 20 per cent of Sanlorenzo\u2019s global total. A fifth of their American customers are newcomers to yachting.<\/p>\n

Sanlorenzo yachts, which sell for an average price of \u20ac12 million, have been custom built in Liguria, northwest Italy, since 1958. Last week the yachtmaker unveiled SHE, or Sanlorenzo Heritage, which is responding to a retro trend in luxury with a 1960s-inspired design.<\/p>\n

\"Sanlorenzo<\/p>\n

Sanlorenzo\u2019s SHE yacht has a retro design<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The 84ft yacht features a long forefoot and open foredeck, with an expansive sundeck, an indoor area that has been compared to a \u201cMilanese lounge\u201d, and accommodation for eight guests and four crew members. It can cruise in hybrid-diesel mode at 20 knots, or silently in full electric mode at 9 knots. <\/p>\n

Perotti said the company is not seeking to attract flashy Wall Street traders or Silicon Valley show-offs. \u201cI would say our customer target is not the Wolf of New York,\u201d he said. \u201cOur customers are real connoisseurs. When we talk about luxury, because yachting is luxury, we talk about quiet luxury.\u201d<\/p>\n

Other yachting professionals have witnessed a growing demand in the US for highly visible, grandiose boats, however.<\/p>\n

Kent Harrington, 36, a San Diego-based sales broker at Edmiston, the superyacht brokerage, said: \u201cThe boats are getting bigger. The clients are getting younger.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cI started working on boats in Cabo [Mexico] when I was 19. Back then the coolest boat in the parking lot was a 50ft Viking, now you have 100-metre yachts up front.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2022 Super-rich working from their yachts thanks to satellite internet<\/a><\/p>\n

While retired people tend to value the privacy of yachts, younger clients are the \u201cfarthest thing\u201d from seeking privacy, Harrington said. They have \u201ceight different channels of social media\u201d, helicopters and and \u201c20 friends on their boat\u201d.<\/p>\n

Perotti is seeking a different kind of customer. \u201cWe like to sell and to have our customer base for people that are close to arts, culture, understatement,\u201d he said. Sanlorenzo customers are \u201cnot buying the boat to show off because, \u2018I\u2019m rich and powerful, so I buy the yacht\u2019. This is a kind of world that is not part of our strategy as a brand.\u201d<\/p>\n

Italian yachtmakers typically appoint American designers to adapt their models to the needs of US customers. Sanlorenzo works with Marty Lowe, a Fort Lauderdale-based yacht interior designer, to advise on US customer preferences, which include more open social spaces, generous bars, ice buckets and air-conditioning. <\/p>\n

The company is planning to start manufacturing yachts in America as soon as the end of next year and will send over some of its Italian craftsmen to train US workers. \u201cWe think that it is perfectly in line with the growth of the company\u201d, Perotti said. \u201cThe US is the largest market in the world.\u201d <\/p>\n

Sailing yachts by Nautor Swan, the Finnish yachtbuilder acquired by Sanlorenzo last year, and some of Sanlorenzo\u2019s Bluegame range of yachts will be manufactured in Pensacola, Florida, in partnership with American Magic, the US challenger for the 36th and 37th America\u2019s Cup.<\/p>\n

\"New<\/p>\n

American Magic has competed in the America\u2019s Cup<\/p>\n

GILLES MARTIN-RAGET\/AFP\/GETTY IMAGES<\/p>\n

Perotti said the decision to launch a manufacturing base in Florida was motivated by the decline in yachtmaking in the US over the past 15 years, which has seen brands such as Christensen Shipyards closed down. He said the decision was made before President Trump\u2019s tariffs, but added that the president\u2019s trade strategy had increased the argument for shifting some manufacturing to the US.<\/p>\n

Perotti said: \u201cWe had that idea well before the new president in America. But then, of course, the tariff strategy from America is helping the transferring of production in the US, so we will be pushed also from the decision of the government.\u201d<\/p>\n

Europe remains Sanlorenzo\u2019s biggest market, thanks to a loyal and resilient client base. Sales in the first half of the year grew 15.4 per cent to \u20ac267.1 million in the region.<\/p>\n

Perotti said that as well as Italian, French and Greek owners, German purchasers have been returning this year since the European Union agreed to invest around \u20ac800 billion in defence spending, while the German government has signed off on a \u20ac500 billion infrastructure fund. <\/p>\n

\u201cThese two huge amounts of money are coming, mainly to Germany, to the entrepreneurs of Germany,\u201d Perotti said. \u201cSo I think that there are two big pushes from the inside of Germany and from Europe in favour of German industry. So that is the reason why the German customers are coming back.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Tom<\/p>\n

Tom Cruise is said to have commissioned a Nautor Swan yacht<\/p>\n

DANIEL CARDENAS\/ANADOLU\/GETTY IMAGES<\/p>\n

In March, Sanlorenzo plans to open a new customer lounge and showroom in Mayfair, London. Perotti said: \u201cThe British are a very good customer, because there is a long tradition in yachting.\u201d He added: \u201cThe first important big yacht user used to be the British before the Second World War \u2014 1920, 1930 mainly was British. So we think that the investment in Mayfair is a good one.\u201d <\/p>\n

He also acknowledged that Mayfair would offer access to customers from the Middle East, Far East and potentially Russia in the future if sanctions are lifted.<\/p>\n

Sanlorenzo only builds about 70 custom boats a year in Italy.<\/p>\n

Perotti also sees an opportunity to revive sailing in America and has opened a new office for Nautor Swan in Newport, Rhode Island, near the Hamptons. Tom Cruise has reportedly commissioned a new Nautor Swan 108ft sailing yacht.<\/p>\n

\u2022 The Dutch shipbuilders for the super-rich<\/a><\/p>\n

Perotti said: \u201cSailing is in decline because to learn to go sailing, you have to make an effort.\u201d Clutching his smartphone, he added: \u201cThe young generation are not keen to do that kind of effort, because they enjoy life through this [smartphone], which is not really a good human way of living life. But it is what it is and we have to fight against it.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cIn life, especially when you get to 65 like myself, is not only a matter of money, it\u2019s also a matter of dreams. It\u2019s a matter of patience. It\u2019s a matter of enjoying to do something good. And we think that if the young people will go back to sailing, that is another proof, a sign of care for the future of the world.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The air of Fort Lauderdale, on Florida\u2019s southeastern coast, is filled with the sound of Lamborghini and Rolls-Royce…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":31376,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[249,251,250],"class_list":["post-31375","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","tag-fort-lauderdale-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31375","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31375"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31375\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31376"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31375"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}