Atlantic Refit Center (ARC), the La Rochelle-based superyacht refit facility, has joined forces with Nepteam Group, the French equity investor. The Nepteam Group, which owns the Couach new build shipyard and the majority of shares in ISM Shipyard, was founded by a number of industrialists in order to stimulate the development of shipyards on France’s Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts. Under the name Arcteam, the newly formed partnership will offer the full range of superyacht new build and refit services, from 20 to 140m, to superyachts on France’s Atlantic coast..

“I am very pleased with this new step. Thanks to the vision of a shareholder that has a strong, long-term vision, we will be able to develop the superyacht refit business on the west coast of France,” says Ste´phane Marcelli, CEO of Atlantic Refit Center and President of Arcteam.

Arcteam will now pursue the work started by the ARC in 2006, while continuing to develop the current all-encompassing superyacht offering in La Rochelle.

Arcteam will now pursue the work started by the ARC in 2006, while continuing to develop the current all-encompassing superyacht offering in La Rochelle.

“Three years ago, we had an agreement with Compositeworks. However, when they were taken over by MB92 the board decided to focus their investment on the Mediterranean,” explains Marcelli. “The partnership that we had with Compositeworks stopped at the end of December 2019 and ARC became an independent shipyard again.

“We wanted to find another partner because it is not easy to bring superyachts to the Atlantic coast,” continues Marcelli. “I always thought that, in order to have superyachts coming to refit on the Atlantic coast, we should invest in proper facilities, and for this we needed to have popper partnerships with a bigger player than we are at ARC. This is the reason why I met with the Netgroup Team.”

With two dry docks of 176m and 107m in length, three berths of up to 100m and 2,000sqm of hard standing area, ARC, which is based in La Rochelle on the Atlantic coast, between Bordeaux and St-Nazaire, is well placed to cater to some of the world’s largest superyachts. Much has been made of the increasing size of superyachts, in particular the growth 60m-plus sector, and the lack of infrastructure available to cater to them.

“The idea now is to be able, together with IMS Shipyard and Atlantic Refit Centre, to set up a new company under the name of Arcteam, to offer superyacht clients the full range of services for yachts,” says Marcelli. “At the moment [ARC] will remain a separate entity, Arcteam is more like a brand. It is not decided yet, but in the near future it might change.

“The first priority is to share know-how and technologies between IMS, ARC and Couach, with the potential to share some design studio resources as well. Secondly, we can share our network of quality sub-contractors.”

At The Superyacht Forum, we will explore the next generation infrastructure in a session exploring ownership cyles, lifecycle modelling and how the industry supports the client and the fleet. Join us in Amsterdam from 18th – 20th November at the RAI by clicking here, as we ensure our industry is ‘Building for the Next Generation’ at the 2019 edition of The Superyacht Forum in association with METSTRADE.

 Images: Bernard Henry / Atlantic Refit Center

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