ray dalio super yacht

By SuperyachtNews 06 Jun 2018

Ray Dalio announces OceanX and M/V ‘Alucia2’

New initiative and vessel aim to revolutionise ocean research and media….

Superyacht owner and philanthropist Ray Dalio, with his son Mark, director James Cameron and a number of other leading scientific partners, announced the launch of OceanX yesterday. This initiative, to further explore the ocean for educational and scientific purposes, will be undertaken by a brand new vessel, 85m M/V Alucia2 . The project aims to follow the huge success of ocean exploration carried out by Dalio’s existing research vessel, 56m M/V Alucia .

In a statement about Alucia2 and OceanX, Dalio illustrated his passion for conservation and understanding more about our oceans. "I believe that ocean exploration is more exciting and important than space exploration [and] we are on a mission to show people that." The Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation is among the many philanthropic partners of the project.

Alucia2 will be delivered in 2019 and was originally built as a deep-sea diving survey vessel in 2010. According to reports, she will be “the most advanced science and media vessel ever built” and her refit has been designed by Gresham Yacht Design. Features of the vessel include marine research labs, media equipments (and an entire media centre), manned and autonomous deep-sea submersibles, as well as a range of helicopters and drones. James Cameron, known for his filmography and ocean exploration, was consulted throughout the development of the media centre. "With OceanX and Alucia2 , we will reignite global passion for and curiosity about the ocean in our global, digitally-connected age,” said Cameron. In addition to hosting scientists and media teams, OceanX will conduct virtual classes and museum exhibitions for people across the world.

"With OceanX and Alucia2, we will reignite global passion for and curiosity about the ocean in our global, digitally-connected age.”

Ray Dalio is founder of OceanX and the president of Dalio Philanthropies. His son, Mark, is the founder and creative director of OceanX Media, who worked with the BBC team behind the Blue Planet II series. In a conversation with The Superyacht Report last year, Alex Flemming, co-CEO of marine operations for the family office that operates M/V Alucia, revealed the driving force behind Dalio’s entrance into the yacht market. “He is a very intelligent man and he was always fascinated by the scientific community. He was introduced to Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and he was so fascinated and taken aback by what they do – and what they achieve – that he had the idea to buy a boat.”

Flemming also echoed the importance of Dalio’s focus on ocean – not space – exploration through engaging media content. “We are trying to make it interesting, and fun, so that it makes difference and people actually say, ‘that’s cool’. Not only promoting the project and the idea, but also make people aware of what is going on. 70 per cent of our planet is ocean, and we only know about 15 per cent of it, how does that make sense? We’re spending more money trying to populate the moon than we are in our ocean backyard.” The impact of Dalio on the superyacht industry’s attitude to ocean conservation and scientific research is undeniable. Hopefully, his commitment to these causes will inspire more owners to follow his example. And as M/V Alucia has been at the forefront of many exciting ocean discoveries in recent years, we eagerly await the successes of OceanX and M/V Alucia 2 .

All images courtesy of OceanX

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Damen Completes Rebuild of 87 Metre OceanXplorer

Damen has announced its completion of the cutting-edge research vessel OceanXplorer following an extensive two-year rebuild project.

Previously codenamed Alucia2, OceanXplorer is now touted as the most advanced exploration and research vessel in the world, featuring a state-of-the-art scientific research station and a Hollywood-level media production studio developed in partnership with renowned filmmaker James Cameron.

The 87 metre vessel is the flagship of the OceanX fleet, a non-profit ocean exploration and media company spearheaded by billionaire Ray Dalio and his son Mark Dalio. OceanXplorer builds on the success of OceanX's first research vessel, named Alucia , and will continue its mission to uncover the secrets of the ocean and help protect the marine habitat.

Capable of mapping the depths of the oceans, the supersized explorer features sonar arrays, a series of submersibles, a dedicated ROV deployment bay, a forward helicopter landing deck with adjacent climate-controlled hangar and aft deck launch and side boarding systems for scuba divers. The upper deck also features a 40-ton crane and a 40-ton A-frame for the launch and recovery of all her explorative equipment. 

Tjarco Ekkelkamp, project director for the OceanXplorer project at Damen said: “This has been a challenging project, the result of which we are very proud of. On the one hand, this shows the extensive capabilities of Damen as a group. On the other, this is a vessel that represents a force for good in the world – one that will enhance human involvement, understanding and ultimately conservation of our oceans. With our strong commitment to maritime sustainability, we are delighted to have played our part in the development of OceanXplorer .”

OceanXplorer started life as a former offshore survey ship named Volstad Surveyor before heading to Damen Shiprepair in Rotterdam. The rebuild works were intensive with the addition of an integrated heli hangar in the superstructure, as well as extensions on both sides of the accommodation decks to house new cabins. The work also involved the integration of specialist hydrographic and lavatory systems, media studios, and state-of-the-art-research facilities. The vessel was re-designed both inside and out by Steve Gresham.

Also on board are a number of both piloted and autonomous underwater drones and two manned Triton submersibles, each of which can dive to depths exceeding 1000-metres.

OceanXplorer also boasts a media production studio with filmmaking capabilities developed with director James Cameron, allowing the team to create high-quality films at sea. OceanXplorer features state-of-the-art wet and dry marine research labs for analysing scientific discoveries. 

The explorer is to become the subject of a six-part documentary series entitled Mission: OceanX , co-produced by OceanX and BBC Studios, along with James Cameron for National Geographic.

Speaking about the project, OceanX co-founder, Ray Dalio, said: "The ship OceanXplorer will take ocean explorers to never-before-seen undersea worlds and allow them to beam back what they encounter via social media, digital experiences, and a TV show. It will be mind-blowing."

OceanX founder and creative director, Mark Dalio, added: " OceanXplorer will allow us to pair science and media together like never before and share the excitement and wonder of ocean exploration with a global audience in real time."

Designed to build upon the success of the 55.75 metre  Alucia  (the initiative's production arm was formerly known as Alucia Productions), which appeared in the BBC’s highly popular  Blue Planet II  series,  OceanXplorer  was built by  Freire  and launched in 2010.

Design input has been provided by London-based  Gresham Yacht Design . The studio previously said: “The biggest challenge has been making sure that the vessel satisfies the demands of differing disciplines, from the scientist through to the operators of the submarines, ROVs, helicopters and film production."

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We are thrilled to be a part of such an exciting and unique project. These types of projects are rare to come by and we are honoured to have been commissioned by the owner to deliver a design that is extremely functional and robust, it is a true explorer vessel.

With OceanX and Alucia2, we will reignite global passion for and curiosity about the ocean in our global, digitally-connected age.

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Are submersible super-yachts the next adventure for billionaire tourists?

A project led by james cameron to promote deep-sea tourism aspires to more than entertaining the ultra-wealthy.

Ray Dalio has sometimes been compared to Captain Nemo, the unforgettable fictional character from two Jules Verne novels: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1870) and The Mysterious Island (1875). He was an Indian prince and engineer who roamed the seas at the helm of the Nautilus , a submarine described by Verne as “a masterpiece full of masterpieces.” Nemo has appeared in various film adaptations of Verne’s novels, where he has been portrayed by famous actors like James Mason and Michael Caine. A collector of coral, pearls and Renaissance paintings, the captain was a connoisseur and an outlaw, an anti-establishment rebel and a vigilante of the seas. One day he would rescue shipwrecked sailors and defend hard-working Pacific islanders, and the next he would sink ships without thinking twice.

Any similarities between the fictional Nemo and the real-life Dalio are purely coincidental, of course. Dalio is a New Yorker who grew up in Queens, the same New York City borough that produced Donald Trump. He is not an aristocrat or a scientist, but a very successful money manager who founded in 1975 what is now Bridgewater Associates, a multinational venture capital firm.

Nemo and Dalio are immensely rich philanthropists who abhor ostentation and love the underwater world. In a phrase that Nemo could have uttered, Dalio once said that Elon Musk’s plans for space tourism to the Moon and Mars are “a foolish project that holds little interest.” But traveling to the bottom of the sea is indeed worthwhile. “That is where true wonders and real aliens await us.”

The budding submersible yacht industry

In December 2022, Dalio jumped into the luxury recreational diving business when he invested in Triton , the world’s largest manufacturer of civilian submersibles. Co-founded by Patrick Lahey, the company needed investment partners to make and sell submarines that can take ordinary (but rich) people on luxury cruises to unusual places like the Mariana Trench, the world’s deepest oceanic depression. Lahey found two investors to take the plunge — Ray Dalio and filmmaker James Cameron .

Cameron, who made a fortune from huge blockbuster movies like Avatar (2009), Titanic (1997) and Terminator (1984), says his investment in Triton was primarily motivated by the scientific objectives of the new business venture. He believes that private fleets of luxury submarines will enable us “to better understand the 80% of the world’s oceans that are still unexplored.”

Triton’s vessels are equipped with highly advanced imaging systems powered by artificial intelligence that store everything they capture in the audiovisual archive of the human race. In a brief interview with The Financial Times , Dalio said, “If you’re just going on a yacht in some fancy place, that’s one thing. If instead you’re on a yacht and you can go down and explore, first of all the trip is going to be better and also it encourages exploration.”

Look but don’t touch

These underwater adventures aren’t for everyone. Triton submersibles start at $2.5 million and range all the way up to more than $40 million. The base models can only dive to depths of a few hundred yards and can accommodate a maximum of 10 people. The top-of-the-line models are submersible super-yachts that can accommodate 66 guests. The most sophisticated Triton vessels can descend all the way to the bottom of the Mariana Trench in the western Pacific Ocean.

Triton’s website describes its vessels as works of “superlative” engineering intended for “demanding professionals and discerning individuals.” They are built “with the best materials” and equipped with “excellent visibility” due to their “optically perfect” acrylic windows that ensure “a direct and intimate relationship with the depths of the sea.”

Francesca Webster, editor of Super Yacht Times , describes the project as an exciting partnership with “elite collaborators” like Espen Øino, the Monaco-based yacht designer that recently created a futuristic submersible prototype called Project Hercules . Webster called the personal submarine project, “… not just as a toy for the super rich – but a viable tool that can advance human understanding and excitement for the ocean.”

Strange creatures at the bottom of the sea

There are no Johnny-come-latelys in this initiative. Over 30 years ago, James Cameron made The Abyss (1989), a classic science fiction film about a U.S. nuclear submarine’s encounter with an unidentified object in the Cayman Trough. The message was that we are living right next door to unknown worlds in the ocean depths, and that exploring these worlds is the human race’s immediate destiny.

On March 26, 2012, James Cameron proved that he takes his passions very seriously by making a solo descent to 35,787 feet (10,908 meters), give or take a foot, aboard the Deepsea Challenger. It was the first solo dive and only the second crewed dive to reach the deepest point on the planet after oceanographers Jacques Picard and John Walsh made their 1960 descent in the Trieste bathyscaphe.

Shortly after his historic descent, Cameron gave a speech at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco in which he described finding new species of marine worms and sea anemones in the previously unknown New Britain Trench near Papua New Guinea. But the vessel Cameron used over 10 years ago is nothing like the submersible venues that Triton envisions. Back then, Cameron spent nine claustrophobic hours in a tiny cabin measuring just over 35 cubic feet (one cubic meter). “I had to do yoga for six months to become flexible enough to fit in there,” he said.

Oil exploration

Dalio also has some very strong credentials in ocean exploration. In 2016, with a personal fortune of more than $21 billion, the tycoon bought an old oil rig and converted it into a mobile scientific exploration and research center that he named the OceanXplorer. The size of a football stadium and equipped with state-of-the-art technology, the offshore station became the first venture of OceanX, a company that Dalio owns and manages with the youngest of his four sons, Mark.

In his 2017 memoir, Principles: Life and Work , Dalio calls OceanX the crown jewel of his philanthropic work because its mission is to produce knowledge and share it with the world. He also writes that ocean exploration is far more urgent, exciting and necessary than space conquest. In 2018, Mark Dalio persuaded James Cameron to invest in OceanX, which began a partnership that led to the recent investment in Triton.

Patrick Lahey is an engineer and entrepreneur who has been diving since 1975, and says he has contributed to the design of more than 50 manned submersibles. In 2007, Lahey and Steve Jones founded Triton Submarines to build and sell personal submersibles to yacht owners. The company received a boost in 2015 when British scientist and documentary filmmaker David Attenborough rented a Triton vessel to film the second season of the Blue Planet television series on Australia’s Great Barrier Reef.

Monturiol’s shadow

A few years later, Triton, now a thriving business based in Florida that was making five submarines a year, went to the small town of Sant Cugat near Barcelona to start a project inspired by Narcís Monturiol, the 19th-century Spanish inventor and pioneer of underwater navigation. Working closely with Barcelona-based Clúster Nàutic and the Polytechnic University of Catalonia, Triton and its partners are creating submersible prototypes capable of withstanding the low temperatures and high pressures found at the deepest places in the oceans.

Lahey is enjoying the growing popularity of underwater exploration by tourists and is setting his sights next on exploring the Arctic Ocean. He laughs amiably about those who called his idea “inconsistent and ridiculous.” Dalio, Cameron and Lahey feel like the heirs to the dreams and aspirations of those who came before, like Jacques Cousteau and Jules Verne. They will never attack warships with battering rams like Captain Nemo, but they share his thirst for knowledge and adventure, and have added a healthy dose of entrepreneurial pragmatism.

Dalio sums it up in one inspirational sentence. “Yachts aren’t all about opulence… They’re about where these craft can take us. And the experiences you can have with them.” And what’s better than an underwater yacht that can take us to the deepest heavens, even if it does cost $40 million.

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Instead of a luxurious megayacht, Ray Dalio the billionaire hedge fund manager has the world’s most advanced exploration vessel. Helmed by scientists the 285 ft ship has wet and dry labs, helicopters, submarines, and a state-of-the-art media center.

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• These Superyachts Lead a Double Life as Floating Labs for Ocean Research

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The trend of yachts being loaned out to scientists is becoming more common these days as owners make good on promises of promoting sustainability via their vessels. Cruise lines Viking and Ponant have also jumped into the research game, creating luxury expedition vessels with labs that are now integral to their cruise protocols.

This trend is extending to owners designing superyachts that are hybrid research vessels. When Norwegian shipping magnate Kjell Inge Røkke’s REV Ocean launches in 2026 (the current estimated date of delivery), the 600-foot expedition yacht is expected be crowned the world’s largest superyacht. But it will be much more than that. Fully equipped with multiple labs for different disciplines, as well as advanced scientific equipment, the vessel will toggle between three modes: charter, research and expedition.

Other hybrids are already in the water. After a two-year rebuild at Damen that included the addition of research labs as well as a media center designed by film director James Cameron, OceanXplorer left on her maiden voyage in November 2020 to study the secrets of the Red Sea. The 285-foot vessel is the flagship of OceanX , an ocean exploration initiative founded by American businessmen Ray Dalio and his son, Mark.

Then there are owners like one Europe-based entrepreneur, who has designed a new 170-foot explorer yacht, for personal enjoyment and scientific research. As the summer launch date approaches, the owner is in talks with Yachts for Science , a program that connects scientists, researchers and content creators with yacht owners and crew for possible collaborations. The boat will be offered up free of charge for scientific missions. 

Asking not to be named, the owner’s vision, from the first sketches, was to design an ice-class vessel that combines comfort and practicality. Teak decking, for instance, is out. Dry labs, workshops, a diving compressor and special freezing capabilities are in.

Onboard will be two 29.5-foot tenders specifically made for exploration, as well as four cranes, each of which can lift up to four tonnes. The boat also has the potential to bring two containers of research equipment on the rear deck. 

For Seahawk’s American owners, their 170-foot sailing yacht has been a way to travel the world while leaving a legacy of good behind. Since departing the Mediterranean in 2020, the yacht has hosted scientists studying migratory patterns of pelagic species such as sharks and mantas in the Galapagos and Mexico. They have also helped survey coral reefs in Fiji’s Lau Islands, along with driving multiple charitable initiatives.

Seahawk’s rotational captain, Stephen Edwards, acknowledges that the type of equipment scientists bring with them doesn’t always match with the “superyacht perfection” stereotype.

But the tradeoff is the kind of work very few yacht owners and crew will ever experience. “We have video footage of our bosun holding the mouth of a tiger shark while somebody’s doing surgery on the other end,” says Edwards. “For the crew, this type of voyage is unique. They’re not going to see this in any other way.” 

There is also the reward that comes from knowing their efforts have made a difference. One of Seahawk ’s first missions was to find evidence of a shark swim-way between the Cocos Islands National Park in Costa Rica and the Galapagos Islands.

“The hypothesis is that these areas have always been linked together, but it was a matter for science groups to prove this in order to get governments to stop large fishing boats from parking themselves in the middle of this highway and just grabbing everything that swam past,” Edwards says.

Seahawk’s owner provided a platform for an expedition led by MigraMar, a leading authority in migratory species. “We got into it at a good time, thanks to our tagging work,” says Edwards. “It really put facts behind the hypothesis.” Subsequently, at the UN Climate Change Conference in late 2021, a new 24,000-square-mile marine reserve was defined by Ecuador to safeguard migratory species.

Considering that these voyages have coincided with travels Seahawk ‘s owner had already planned, itineraries that combine yachts and science seem to be a win-win for everyone involved. “These missions benefit the crew, science and the environment,” says Edwards. “The concept is also very much part of the owner’s vernacular. He actually calls it his mission.”

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Ray Dalio is investing in submarines for the rich after saying he expects poor returns from financial markets in coming years

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Billionaire investor Ray Dalio invested in a company that builds submarines for the super rich.

The Bridgewater founder alongside Hollywood filmmaker James Cameron are now part owners of Triton Submarines.

The investment comes after Dalio recently said he expects low real returns from financial markets in the coming years.

Bridgewater founder Ray Dalio has invested in a company that makes submarines for the super-wealthy, just weeks after he projected a lackluster outlook for financial markets in the coming years.

According to the Financial Times , the billionaire investor along with Hollywood filmmaker James Cameron have picked up equity stakes in Florida-based Triton Submarines.

"If you're just going on a yacht in some fancy place, that's one thing. If instead you're on a yacht and you can go down and explore, first of all the trip is going to be better and also it encourages exploration," Dalio told the outlet.

Founded in 2007 by Patrick Lahey and Bruce Jones, Triton sells its submarines at prices as high as $40 million.

Dalio did not disclose any financial details of the deal, like the amount invested in the company, but noted himself and Cameron are co-owners of the company, per the FT.

The investment in the submarine maker comes as no surprise given Dalio's interest in ocean exploration, which he's discussed in the past. In 2019, he said he finds underwater exploration a lot more exciting and important than space exploration, during an interview in his personal three-man submarine.

But it also comes alongside Dalio's pessimistic longer-term view on financial markets, where he expects "negative or poor real returns" over the next five years, according to a MarketWatch interview published in October.

Investors have been downbeat over US stocks this year as the Federal Reserve ramps up its fight against 40-year high inflation by sharply raising interest rates. The aggressive monetary tightening caused the S&P 500 index of US stocks to slip into bear market territory earlier this year, and many investors now expect the world's largest economy to enter a recession next year.

Dalio has previously estimated that stocks could plunge 20% if the Fed raises rates past 4.5%. The central bank's benchmark rate is currently between 3.75% and 4%, up 375 basis points this year.

Read the original article on Business Insider

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The Latest Trend on Yachts? Submersibles.

Only boats at least 120 feet long can hold a sub, which typically costs between $2 million to $7 million. Manufacturers of the deep-sea vessels say many of their clients are wealthy enthusiasts.

By Ephrat Livni ,  Michael J. de la Merced and Sarah Kessler

Charles Kohnen, co-founder of the submersible manufacturer SEAmagine Hydrospace, estimates that there are 200 manned vessels worldwide. Some are used by scientific institutions, others for tourism. But a growing number belong to a select group of yacht owners.

While a ticket aboard a submersible tour, like the one that ended in tragedy this year en route to the Titanic shipwreck, is too pricey for most people, owning a submersible requires another level of wealth and boating infrastructure.

Only sufficiently large yachts — at least 120 feet — can hold a sub, which typically costs between $2 million to $7 million (not including the cost of a crane to lower the sub, the speedboat needed to board, and services like mapmaking and guides that can run about $15,000 per day).

“It’s not like a fancy car,” Kohnen said. “It’s more like a $5 million spacecraft.”

Just as having a helicopter and launchpad on a yacht was hot in the 1980s, Kohnen said, getting a personable submersible is increasingly a thing for the wealthy.

Ofer Ketter, whose company, SubMerge, caters to personal sub owners, sees a similar trend. “You have a mega-yacht, a super yacht — a submersible has become the next thing to have,” he said.

Deep-sea explorations have a growing fan base among the elite. The filmmaker James Cameron and the billionaire investor Ray Dalio have both donated vessels to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and invested in the submersible manufacturer Triton Submarines . Dalio said it was about discovery. “The ocean is the greatest resource we have,” he said. “It’s twice the size of all continents combined — and underexplored.”

Some submersible owners lend out their vessels for documentaries and scientific research, while others are in search of never-before-seen species or want to explore shipwrecks. And there is a kind of mixed-use model that is versatile for everything from an underwater wedding to cocktails on the reef, dinner or a poker game, said Craig Barnett, Triton’s director of sales and marketing.

The personal submersibles industry has grown with the size of yachts. When SEAmagine started in 1995, mostly robots were used for deep-sea scientific work because lowering submersibles into the ocean with people inside was unwieldy, Kohnen said. The company built a model that could be boarded from the water, and this relaunched an era of manned submersibles for science and tourism. Around 2005, SEAmagine got its first yacht commission — and competition. Another submersible manufacturer, U-Boat Worx, started operations in the Netherlands, and Triton soon followed. Yachts were becoming bigger, but, Kohnen said, people were also starting to value experience-seeking over luxury.

Making “the moment.” Where to dive and how long an expedition lasts depends, but an adventure can take months of planning to scout, map and set up. SubMerge has coordinated five expeditions with three different private clients this year, Ketter said, and the company works with about six luxury travel firms, including submersible manufacturers.

A typical day “in a good spot” usually involves a few dives that last about an hour or two, with breaks for meals, Kohnen said. “Even after a thousand dives, it never stops being exciting.”

What about the implosion of the Titan? The fatal OceanGate tour shined a harsh spotlight on deep-sea adventure. But Kohnen said the craft involved was an “outlier” that was not built to specifications and had been a cause of concern in the submersible community for years.

Ketter said that his company had not had any cancellations since the accident. Triton likewise said that it had no cancellations, that it was building five submersibles and experiencing “remarkable demand” from private owners and tourism companies.

Although private submersibles are gaining momentum, Barnett said, the number of scientific institutions using them was “regrettably low.” Dalio said he thought filming the ocean from private craft would spur more investment and exploration. “It’s very underfunded, but it’s picking up,” he said. — Ephrat Livni

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

The Fed could pause interest-rate rises next month as inflation cools. Consumer prices rose moderately in July , according to Consumer Price Index data released this week, and consumers expect inflation to slow over the next year , a closely watched University of Michigan survey showed. The wild card is volatile food and fuel prices, which could add to inflationary pressures.

Goldman Sachs’s longtime chief of staff steps aside. DealBook reported that John Rogers , the bank’s longtime chief of staff, would start handing over some of his responsibilities to Russell Horwitz, a former deputy. The shake-up occurs as Goldman’s C.E.O., David Solomon, conducts an overhaul of the bank, which has seen prominent executives leave.

Disney vows to stem streaming losses and doesn’t rule out selling its TV businesses. The entertainment giant’s C.E.O., Bob Iger, said subscription-price increases for Disney+ and Hulu would go into effect in the fall. And, like Netflix, it will crack down on password sharing . Wall Street is getting impatient as Disney’s streaming losses have ballooned to more than $11 billion since 2019.

Zoom’s A.I. data policy sets off a backlash. The popular videoconferencing platform issued a clarification this week that it would seek customers’ consent before using their audio, video or chat data to train artificial intelligence models. Digital rights’ advocates, however, worry that may not be enough to protect unsuspecting Zoom users as privacy concerns multiply alongside the explosion in popularity of A.I. tools like the ChatGPT and Bard chatbots.

A Kennedy bets on start-ups that serve the disabled

The Kennedy family has for decades made advocacy for the disabled one of its signature causes, from Senator Ted Kennedy sponsoring the Americans With Disabilities Act to Eunice Kennedy Shriver founding the Special Olympics.

Now, a scion of the political dynasty, Christopher McKelvy, has teamed up with Judd Olanoff, a former JPMorgan Chase banker, to approach disabilities in a new way: by starting a venture capital firm focused on the community.

Meet K. Ventures. McKelvy — a grandson of Patricia Kennedy Lawford and a former tech executive — and Olanoff initially worked together on public policy advocacy for people with disabilities and their families at the Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. Foundation. (McKelvy is a trustee at the foundation.)

They realized that the start-up sector offered both new services for the disabled and viable business models that could scale because of developments like Medicaid reimbursements. McKelvy and Olanoff left the foundation last year to start their firm. Its backers include Brian Jacobs, a longtime investor who runs Moai Capital, who told DealBook that the founders’ connections “are definitely unique and valuable.”

“My family’s hope,” McKelvy told DealBook, “is that K Ventures will be the next chapter” of our work on behalf of the disabled.

The firm is a bet on the growing market for disability services. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that up to 27 percent of the country’s population has some kind of disability. The agency also found in 2020 that one in 36 children has been diagnosed with autism, up from one in 44 in 2018, thanks to better recognition of symptoms.

Olanoff said big companies were also starting to invest in providing disability services and benefits, presenting an opportunity for start-ups.

K. Ventures has made three investments, including Juno, which provides cash benefits to parents if their children become severely injured or disabled; Juniper, which automates billing for behavioral health services providers; and NeuroNav, which helps adults with developmental disabilities in California devise their own customized help services.

Major investment firms have also started to take notice of the opportunity: Andreessen Horowitz and Y Combinator have backed Juniper, while Pear VC has invested in NeuroNav.

McKelvy and Olanoff are using the Kennedy name and resources, including by bringing in advice and networking opportunities from relatives like Tim Shriver, the chairman of the Special Olympics, and Patrick Kennedy, the former congressman. For the past two years, it has also hosted a forum for disability start-ups at the Kennedy compound in Massachusetts.

Shriver believes disability advocacy needs philanthropy, but also businesses with sustainable and profitable operating models. When his team heard about K Ventures, he said, “we thought, bingo, that’s the missing piece.”

The reporting behind Netflix’s ‘Painkiller’

The Supreme Court temporarily blocked a bankruptcy deal for the Sackler family’s Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, on Thursday. The agreement would have capped the liability of the Sacklers at $6 billion and protected the family from any more civil lawsuits connected to the opioid epidemic. But the ruling will likely delay payments to the thousands of people who sued the Sacklers and Purdue.

In 2003, Barry Meier published “Pain Killer,” a book about the illegal methods and distorted science that Purdue had used to promote OxyContin. This week, Netflix released a fictionalized series based on the book starring Matthew Broderick as Richard Sackler, the former president of the company, who led the push to develop the drug and make it a routine treatment for pain.

DealBook spoke with Meier, a former reporter at The New York Times, about what had changed — and had not — since he first began investigating the role companies played in the crisis. This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Why does the story remain so relevant two decades after the book was published?

It’s remarkable, and sad that it took as long as it did for the book to reach this big audience. But there’s hardly a person in this country who hasn’t been affected in some way. It’s 20 years from when it was published, and during that time more than a quarter of a million people died of overdoses from prescription opioids like OxyContin.

You said the book was a “total flop” when it was published. Was there an inflection point when people started paying more attention to the story of Purdue Pharma?

It started about 2017, 2018, when there was this new wave of lawsuits brought against not only Purdue, but individually against members of the Sackler family. That was a real turning point, because we began to see internal documents that were written by Richard Sackler. And, subsequent to that, the photographer Nan Goldin began her campaign for museums to take the Sackler name down from their walls, which turned out to be a remarkably successful political and cultural campaign.

Has anything changed in the relationship between the pharmaceutical industry and Washington?

I would hope that the Food and Drug Administration will never again make a decision as catastrophic as it did when it allowed Purdue to claim that this incredibly powerful and potentially addictive drug might be safer than competing drugs without even a shred of evidence.

But you can never be sure. I have seen numerous instances where a medical product that was valuable for a limited pool of patients has run amok because its manufacturer decided that in order to make billions of dollars, it was going to have to promote it to as many patients as possible — patients for whom the benefits of the drug began to be outweighed by its substantial risks. This is not a pattern that’s unique to OxyContin.

Could that pattern be shut down?

Until we start seeing corporate executives marched off to prison for violating the trust that doctors and patients have put into them, nothing is going to change.

We’d like your feedback. Please email thoughts and suggestions to [email protected] .

Ephrat Livni reports from Washington on the intersection of business and policy for DealBook. Previously, she was a senior reporter at Quartz, covering law and politics, and has practiced law in the public and private sectors.   More about Ephrat Livni

Michael de la Merced joined The Times as a reporter in 2006, covering Wall Street and finance. Among his main coverage areas are mergers and acquisitions, bankruptcies and the private equity industry. More about Michael J. de la Merced

Sarah Kessler is a senior staff editor for DealBook and the author of “Gigged,” a book about workers in the gig economy. More about Sarah Kessler

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Candela’s all-electric-powered hydrofoiling passenger ferry poised to transform global ferry transportation.

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The all-electric-powered Candela P-12 ferry flies over the water on hydrofoils

I would never say “I told you so,” but…now that Candela , the world’s leading producer of all-electric-powered hydrofoiling boats, has just closed the largest funding round in the company's history, I might be bold enough to say…”I’m not surprised.”

That’s because I’ve been closely following the development of this wonderfully smart company’s hydrofoiling boats since I test flew a P-7 near their small and efficient shop in Stockholm in 2021. So, I’m really not surprised they just raised over $25 million to expand production of their game-changing P-12 ferry. And since yacht building powerhouse Groupe Beneteau is a key partner in the largest fundraising round Candela has ever completed it appears Candela’s brand of tech-controled hydrofoiling is about to go global.

“Our investment perfectly aligns with Groupe Beneteau‘s ecological transition objectives, scaling up innovative solutions for more sustainable boating and unparalleled experiences,” says Bruno Thivoyon, CEO of Groupe Beneteau, the world's largest boat manufacturer (15 factories, 9 brands, and more than 8,000 yachts built annually) with a total revenue of over $1.5 billion in 2023. “Candela’s technology, enabling significantly more efficient electric vessels, will transform waterborne transport into its next sustainable phase.”

A Candela P-8 and P-12 underway near Stockholm, Sweden

“We couldn’t be more excited about having Groupe Beneteau on board,” says Gustav Hasselskog, Founder and CEO of Candela. “As the leading global boat company, their trust is a stamp of approval for our technology to transform waterborne transportation. We’re excited for the possibilities ahead."

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The new investment round will help to scale up production to meet demand for the recently launched Candela P-12, the world’s first electric hydrofoil ferry. The P-12 is the first fast and long-range electric ferry on the market. Its efficient hydrofoil technology cuts lifetime emissions by 97.5% compared to diesel vessels, while simultaneously allowing operators to save up to 50% in operating costs. Since it generates minimal wake, the P-12 has been granted exemptions from speed limits, as for example on its maiden route in Stockholm, where it from July will cut travel times in half compared to road transport and legacy diesel vessels.

And it’s pretty obvious Hasselskog and company are on the right track. According to some projections the market for electric vessels is expected to be worth $14.2 Billion USD in 2030.

“We’ve spent years developing the technological maturity, and now we’re fit for scaling to commercial vessels. As in any industry, the fastest-scaling company will dominate the market,” says Hasselskog.

The Candela P-8 and P-12 hardly make a ripple as they fly over the water on computer-controlled ... [+] hydrofoils

Other backers in the round include longtime investors EQT Ventures , Ocean Zero LLC , and Kan Dela AB. The new investment brings total funding since Candela’s inception to over $75 million.

“EQT Ventures has steadfastly backed Candela's vision to accelerate the shift towards fossil fuel-free lakes and oceans since 2021. The launch of Candela's P-12 vessels signifies a watershed moment in sustainable transport", says Lars Jörnow, Partner at EQT Ventures.

The only question is: when will we see a P-12 ferry here in the US?

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