Wind in your sails

Yachts and sports boats are the latest must-haves for the super rich in India.

Forget the marinas on the Mediterranean and Caribbean Sea, yachts are sailing smoothly into makeshift marinas right here in India, off the shores of Alibaug, Kochi and Goa.

The financial downturn may have knocked the wind out of the luxury yacht market in the West. But in India, buying fancy liners is a growing trend among the super-rich — everyone from business tycoons and oil barons to bankers. You have Vijay Mallya, of course, self-appointed King of Good Times and proud owner of numerous yachts, including the 311-feet Indian Empress, which is often used to promote his Formula One team.

 

But with 2,700 kilometres of unexplored coastline, experts now anticipate an explosion in boating activities and estimate the market in India to grow to $1 billion in the next five years. No wonder, global yacht-making companies are making a beeline for India, offering wealthy Indians lots of options and lucrative deals in luxury vessels. There’s something even for first time buyers — anyone who can spend between Rs 15 lakh and Rs 60 lakh.

Here’s a pick of what’s available in yachts this season:

The maxi yachts
Tecnomar, an Italian luxury maxi-yacht maker, has decided to foray into India and hopes to clinch at least two to three orders this year. Having done business of about Rs 500 crore globally last year, the company has high hopes of the 141-footer Nadara, touted to be world’s largest tri-deck super-yacht. With prices starting at ¤4 million, the Nadara yachts are made in Italian shipyards. Not only are they very fast, with a top speed of 30 knots, but they also have six cabins for guest and four cabins in the bow for the crew.

“Our boats are customised to the core, so prices vary on what a buyer wants to put in them,” says Francesco Carbone, sales director, Tecnomar. “For instance, on a 50-foot yacht, one owner could spend $150,000 on audio-visual equipment alone, while someone else could spend a million dollars to get the surround sound system connected to a satellite that could call-up DVDs of 500 movies instantaneously,” he adds.

Not surprisingly then, an army of skilled artisans is required to create these mega yachts. “We have customised interiors styled by global brand Armani, and purchase paintings and artifacts from all over the world. In short, we do whatever the client wishes in his boat,” says Carbone.

For a trailer, you could take along 10 guests for a spin on Richard Branson’s fancy, $88,000-a-week catamaran, with its four plush en-suite staterooms and luxurious lounge in the main cabin.

The ‘affordable’ luxury yacht
For proud owners, yachts are a second home, as Malav Shroff, Olympian yachtsman and co-founder of Ocean Blue, a company that deals in and manufactures luxury yachts, understands too well. “Instead of focussing on the size of a yacht, owners look at what they can fit into it,” he says. The design process in a luxury sailboat, he feels, is very important.

Shroff’s company recently collaborated with Finland-based Nautor’s Swan, a well-known international brand of yachts. The partnership, he claims, should result in exquisitely crafted yachts on the Indian seas very soon. “We expect to launch at least 10 luxury boats over the next three years along with Nautor’s Swan, which has built over 4,000 yachts in the last 40 year.”

But you don’t have to be a business tycoon to buy a luxury yacht today, says Anju Dutta, managing director of Mumbai-based Marine Solutions. “A yacht is something you go out and buy with your bonus nowadays,” she smiles. While the recession put partial brakes on what Dutta calls “the ultimate status symbol”, buyers, she says, are now back to acquiring bigger yachts and “flipping them like condos in Alibaug”.

This year, Marine Solutions hopes to sell at least seven luxury yachts, with prices starting at Rs 2.5 crore. “You don’t need a boat show to confirm sales in an industry like ours. We have had strong interest from buyers and will deliver the first luxury yacht very soon to our Indian buyer.”

Though she’s tightlipped and refuses to name Indian clients who are queuing up to buy, Dutta confirms that clients have commissioned yachts that she describes as nothing less than “floating palaces”. It can get very tough too sometimes, she admits. “They come, at times literally, with a list of the things they want. Or they’ll just say, ‘I want it white’.”

When small becomes big
Apart from luxury yachts, experts say that jet skis, sports boats and speed boats are also on the wish list of many rich Indians. Interestingly, a lot of people have already started using them as a mode of transport to access beachfront houses in Alibaug and Mandwa. “Small boats are a hit among young Indians, especially when they have cruise parties,” confirms Riyhad Kundanmal, director of Ocean Crest Marine, a yacht dealer.

What advice would he give novices who aspire to buy their own boats? Kundanmal recommends a trip to boat shows where people can review products, get brochures and gain some knowledge of local dealers.

Buying a speedboat, notes Kundanmal, is economical (rupees one lakh onwards) and ideal for those who want to possess their own yachts in the near future. “You won’t be sad when you crash it into the dock a few times,” he says. Companies like Yamaha and Sea-Doo too offer jet sport boats. In fact, Yamaha’s basic models cost anywhere between Rs 7 lakh and Rs10 lakh.

But money is hardly the criteria when it comes to buying boats. Why, even the beleaguered golf player Tiger Woods is wooing his wife with a $2 million sailboat this season.