Stronger together

…but Doyle Sails will continue to compete against its former arch rivals

Sustained growth, vigorous and innovative development and strong performance in the grand prix and superyacht sectors have led to private equity giant Oakley Capital adding Doyle Sails to its North Technology Group of companies.

The deal was cemented in the middle of 2024 and is proceeding smoothly with assurances that the strong rivalry between the group’s sailmaking brands will continue to drive design and technology and the industry forward.

North Technology Group (NTG) comprises 13 marine-related companies, including North Sails and its related offshoots, Doyle Sails and Quantum Sails, Southern Spars, Future Fibres and Hall Spars.

‘We will continue to compete with the other sailmaking brands,’ says Mike Sanderson, president of Doyle Sails. ‘Our intellectual property, our materials, our designs, our people – everything stays within Doyle Sails. The brands remain separate and the fight lives on.’

‘We have some very passionate owners who feel part of the Doyle Sails family,’ he continues. ‘They are part of the team and they love to see the underdog fighting against the big guys. We would be doing them and the sport as a whole a disservice if we didn’t respect that.’

Sanderson says sailmaker brand identity has become an integral part of the sport and must be maintained. ‘Whether you are racing an 8m sports boat or a J-Class, you tend to have loyalty to one brand. You are either a Doyle boat, a North boat, or a Quantum boat etc. It is a big aspect of the sport and there is no doubt that the rivalry has been healthy for all the brands with regards to product development and innovation – and that is good for all concerned.’

NTG CEO Sam Watson says the attraction in acquiring Doyle Sails lay first and foremost in the people: ‘Mike and his team have put together an impressive group of people around the world who are really respected and trusted by their owners. Doyle has done a great job of partnering with yacht owners and becoming an integral part of their sailing activities, whether it is racing, cruising, or anything in between. We like that.’

Echoing the commitment to maintain competition between the brands, he says there are real differences between them, their value propositions and why clients choose them. ‘Retaining brand separation and investing in product development and innovation by each of the brands will move the state of the art forward more quickly,’ he says. That is the best outcome for the customers and the industry.’

In terms of access to capital, Watson says NTG has already identified opportunities. ‘Mike and the Doyle Sails team have brought some ideas to us that we are super- enthusiastic about. Consequently we have already made additional investments in the business and, absolutely, we will keep doing that.

‘There are also manufacturing and supply chain synergies that will make the businesses more efficient. Leveraging some of the scale NTG brings to the equation will be re-invested back into R&D.’

Conversations about a potential deal began about four years ago, with a Covid-related pause in between. It took until the 2023 Metstrade Show in Amsterdam for discussions to resume in earnest.

During the hiatus, a bizarre misfortune led to a good outcome for the Doyle Sails negotiating team. Sanderson and his family were anchored in a bay north of Auckland when the boat behind them caught fire. The owners were ashore on a hike, so, armed with every fire extinguisher he could find, Sanderson leaped into his tender and raced across to fight the blaze.

‘Unfortunately the fire really caught hold and I wasn’t able to save the boat,’ he says.‘It was a devastating situation.’ However, as a result, a nodding acquaintance with Graham Clarke, the owner of the boat, turned into a friendship and ultimately a valuable business relationship.

‘Graham came from a financial background and had recently sold his own business to a private equity group,’ says Sanderson. ‘Because he had been through the same process with his own company, his experience was very beneficial.’

Once negotiations began in earnest – ‘which were tough but very fair’ – it took about seven months to get ink to paper. ‘One of the things that we quickly aligned on was the importance of treating our people right,’ he says.

‘Over the years my partners in Doyle Sails – David Duff (Duffy), Richard Bouzaid – and I dragged a lot of our professional sailing mates into the Doyle family as we emphasised the “by sailors, for sailors” concept that has been such a crucial part of our success. I had to make absolutely sure that every one of them would be treated fairly or my name would be mud.

‘The good thing is that NTG and Oakley totally got it. They understood the need for everybody to be excited about the outcome and motivated to keep going.’

In a sense, this development represents the closing of a circle for Sanderson. After leaving school he joined North Sails New Zealand as an apprentice with a view to progressing into professional sailing. As his sailing career advanced to success at the highest grand prix levels – including the Volvo Ocean Race and the America’s Cup – he stepped away from sailmaking. Then, about a decade ago he returned to the industry, first buying into and ultimately taking over leadership of Doyle Sails.

Now the NTG deal brings Sanderson back alongside North Sails, where his career began. Although he confesses to ‘not having a business bone in my body’, he approached running Doyle Sails as a sailing campaign. ‘I told myself this is winnable,’ he says and accordingly applied to the business all the aspects of building a team, developing skills and strategies and demanding of himself and his fellow players the same commitment to 100 per cent performance that he had successfully applied in sport.

The strategy has worked well. Over the past decade, Doyle Sails has gained significant market share, particularly in the grand prix and superyacht sectors. It has also gained attention for the constant stream of high profile sailors joining the brand, and equally for product development and innovation with design breakthroughs including Cable-less technology, Structured Luff upwind and downwind sails, high-performance materials such as Stratis and, more recently, Hybrid.

Turnover has increased by 235 per cent, the global loft network has grown to just over 50, with more than 500 employees. Results in the world’s most competitive circuit events have shown a steady rise, culminating in the 2024 season, when Doyle Sails claimed victories in most of the major inshore and offshore superyacht and grand prix events.

‘I think it was quite a healthy approach to bring the sporting campaign mentality that Duffy, Richard and I all share, to the business world,’ says Sanderson. ‘In those terms, this NTG deal is another solid result.

‘I think the really smart thing is that it clears the crystal ball for the future,’ he continues. ‘We have all seen sailmaking brands come and go in the past. We are not so arrogant that we believe history will not repeat itself in our case.

‘There was always going to be a question of, will Doyle Sails be able to keep eating away at the grand prix and superyacht market, or will NTG just flex its muscle? Now we have confidence about our ability to both run the business and invest for growth, where previously we sometimes had to choose between one or the other.

‘Whether the crystal ball becomes murky again in four, eight, or 10 years will depend on how good a job we do as a collective. If we do a really good job of keeping up a competitive environment between the brands – particularly technically and commercially – and keep it fun and exciting, it could go on much longer.

Below: the 52ft Reichel/ Pugh sled Vitesse, pictured here during the Transpac Race

‘From our point of view, we must always remember what people like about what we do at Doyle Sails. Attention to detail and the bespoke approach to each individual programme and campaign. How we are embedded and committed to working with our owners and teams to achieve their goals. The personal attention. How we work with their naval architects and sailing teams to understand exactly what they want and how to deliver it. How we keep striving to improve every aspect of our game.

‘It is all about personal relationships and meeting expectations. We have to remember what got us here. That is the most important thing. If we go away from that, we are acutely aware that it will be our undoing.’

While all three NTG sailmaking companies are fully committed to continuing as competitors, Sanderson indicated the war would be conducted under a Geneva Convention-type framework. ‘In the past, competition may have sometimes got in the way of sound decision-making, but now NTG is there to ensure this comes first,’ he says.

Watson accepts his role as referee with a chuckle. ‘I think of NTG as my sport,’ he says. ‘Competitive instinct is essential for business survival, let alone success.’ He says when former brand rivals – ‘and some of them have been quite extreme’ – find themselves under the NTG umbrella, their relationships change.

‘The environment remains competitive, but it is different. It becomes more like a sibling rivalry than all-out war but it is still there and it is significant. I think it is good. We want to promote that. That is where the drive, energy and innovation comes from. And that ultimately turns into better products, better customer experience, better outcomes.’

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