Superyachts by 2020 – the results of the Hamburg superyacht interiors international conference 2015
On the 29th-30th of June 2015, I was called to do the opening speech at the Superyacht interior international conference (links below), an invitation I gladly accepted. The focus of the conference was on design trends, construction materials, efficient project management, cooperation and communication among the stakeholders that are regularly involved in the creation of a new superyachts and refitting of exiting vessels.
As I was given the responsibility to do the first lecture and the opening speech of the conference I decided with the team to stick to what we do best and open the conference with hard data on the yachting industry. We prepared the market data and forecasts on the superyacht segment (>24mt) together with qualitative trend analysis we created with the help of our panel of experts, our business partners and some of our clients.
The scope of Rodriquez Consulting’s presentation at the Superyacht conference had to have at least two goals:
– goal #1 Inform and deliver a superyacht market analysis framework for the participants to use as a guideline in terms of market size forecasts and benchmarks and
-goal #2 Start and fuel the conversation regarding trends, ideas, process innovation, and elements that are challenging the yacht industry while building the super yachts and the market towards 2020.
I was pleased with the feedback received from our presentation (download link here) of the participants among which industry leading brands(shipyards) such as Lurssen Yachts the builder of the worlds biggest superyacht Azzam, Oceanco the shipyard that built award winning Alfa Nero, Fincantieri, Italy’s biggest passenger (cruiseliners) that is set to become a power player in superyacht and gigayacht (100mt+) building.
Among the top players of yacht interior outfitting highly experienced participants such as Anjia Matzing from Metrica Interior and Mr Antonio Costamante of AIM Yacht Interiors were contributing to make the round tables particularly interesting together with the Managing Director of Genesis Technologies AG, Thorsten Steinbrecher a specialist firm in advanced audio/video entertainment systems and even commercial aviation representatives such as Antje Terno from Airbus.
The materials discussion was driven by Alan Mcvitty from M Studio Rob Henderson from UN studio, Ian Langham from Eckersley O’Callaghan together with Sandrine Mialy, who presented a very innovative optical fibre textile (see video below) that triggered the creativity of the designers and architects attending the conference.Rodriquez Consulting analysis was focusing on delivering answers the most usual questions we get:
- How big is the superyacht industry in 2015 in terms of units and value
- How big will the superyachts industry will be in 2020
- How many clients are there (Ultra High Net Worth Individuals) and how much money will they be making by 2020
- Where and how are they investing their investable wealth and what is the target market (U-HNWIs) allocation within the realm of the Investment of Passion ?
- How are the demographic and psychographic profiles of the HNWIs changing towards 2020?
Right after the presentation, thanks to the opinions and debate sparking from the 2 intense days of round tables and challenging Q&As, we are editing the document to make it optimal for readers (without a speaking presenter) and a useful guideline on some of the hot topics of superyacht building including;
- How to improve the yacht building process (with a special focus on the interiors and fittings) and what are the current issues to be addressed in terms of processes, tools, communication methods, and coordination of the stakeholders (system specialists, designers, shipyards, certification bodies.
- The design challenges, new materials, techologies, and the who and where of the innovation value chain.
- Marketing, using modern technology to enhance the experiential value and improve speed and efficiency in generating new leads, improving lead-to-customer speed and responsiveness of the sales team.
- Diagnostic of custom quotes, risk assessment for interior specialists, liability budgeting.
- How to scope the wants and needs of clients correctly to facilitate contractors quotation and mitigate risk (The Elevator Case)
These and a few other questions have been answered during our presentation which you can find available for download at this link (DOWNLOAD).
