For These Billionaires, It’s All About Cruise Fleets
The industry keeps growing, and niche markets are ripe for deep-pocketed disruption.
It was a cold and cloudy July day in Reykjavik, and French arts patron Maryvonne Pinault was at a pier fulfilling her godmother duties for Le Laperouse, the first of six 184-passenger, upscale expedition yachts from her husband’s Marseilles-based cruise line Compagnie du Ponant. French billionaire and Kering SA chairman Francois Pinault wasn’t there to watch his wife smash a bottle of Champagne against the ship’s hull in the time-honored nautical tradition. But it was always going to be her ship more than his; buying the cruise company was Madame Pinault’s idea, after all.
In 2015, Pinault’s holding company, Groupe Artemis, acquired Ponant from Bridgepoint Capital for an undisclosed sum. Now the cruise line, which reports annual revenues of about $182 million, is part of a luxury portfolio that also includes Gucci, Christie’s auction house, and famed vineyard Château Latour. The Pinaults, by extension, are joining a tight-knit community of billionaires in the cruise industry, ranging from newcomer Richard Branson to industry forefather Micky Arison and the self-made Norwegian upstart, Torstein Hagen.