Has the Four Seasons Yachts project hit the rocks? A shakeup in top management doesn’t appear to have altered its plans to start cruising in 2025.
But it remains a mystery why to key execs abandoned ship. Cruise superstar Larry Pimentel, who was President and CEO, along with co-founder Philip Levine both have left the company developing ultra-luxury ships in a partnership with Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts.
Everything was apparently going great when Pimentel was giving upbeat updates about the project just a few months ago. “There will be nothing else like it on the open seas,” Pimentel told The Cruisington Times in an interview in 2023. “We are bringing together the very best across industries to create the pinnacle yachting offering, through world-class design, curated experiences and truly exceptional service. ”
Company owner Miami-based Marc-Henry Cruise Holdings that owns a Four Seasons Hotel in Florida has ordered two 90-passenger yachts from Italian shipyard Fincantieri for delivery in 2025 and 2026. Four Seasons Yachts was so confident of an overwhelming demand it recently opened invitation-only booking for cruises at prices that start at $2,500 a night per person and go much higher.
At the 2022 launch of the company in Monte Carlo, Levine and Pimentel said Four Seasons Yachts had been a dream of theirs for more than 15 years. Pimentel is a veteran luxury cruise executive who is the past president and CEO of Azamara, SeaDream Yacht Club, Cunard and Seabourn, and a board member of Virtuoso Travel.
The departures of the two execs was announced simultaneously in January. Levine resigned from the board and has contracted to sell his interest in the venture to existing shareholders, according to Seatrade Cruise News.
Pimental and Levine have so far not been available to comment and Marc-Henry Holdings has said only that it’s beginning a search for a new CEO, suggesting there was no advance warning of their departures.
So is the ultra-luxury yacht dream about to end?
The company is still takng bookings and says its first ship will debut in 2025. It signed a contract in March to use the Versonix Seaware as its reservation system, for pre/post programs, air travel, on board activities, and shore excursions with an unlimited number of passengers and voyages.
Wallace Immen, Executive Editor, The Cruisington Times
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