Most recently, the big noise has surrounded two new Persico-branded yachts, both with electric propulsion. One is the Verdier-designed 100-foot (30.48m) performance cruiser Magic Carpet e, delivered late last year.
The other is the 72ft (21.95m) catamaran Extreme H2O, a Swiss army knife of a multihull designed by Morelli & Melvin with 23ft (7m) righting moment foils, daggerboards and rudders with elevators. Currently being sea-trialled by American Magic, she is rumoured to be capable of 26kts upwind and 40kts down, flying eight inches (20cm) above the water.
Both of these yachts were built at the Persico Marine facility in La Spezia. ‘We have two different facilities,’ says company president Marcello Persico. ‘La Spezia specialises in custom cruising yacht build, assembly, systems, interiors and fit-out, while here in Nembro we have the composite expertise to build racing projects like the AC75 Luna Rossa, IMOCAs and foils. We just started a 75ft mini-maxi a few weeks ago. We have these two facilities with different skills and assets but they all work together as part of the same company taking the yachting world to extremes.
‘Here amid the hills of Bergamo in Nembro we have the seven-axis eight to 25-metre giant milling machines, the Coriolis tape placement machine and the autoclaves, and we can laminate in clean rooms. The milling machines are fully dedicated to marine and are built for complex shapes and sizes.
'If we need to move faster, then we can up-scale with nine more machines at our automotive plant, or even tap into 20+ machines through our sister companies. It’s a process that requires all this equipment. You may start shaping the mould with the CNC machine then prepare the laminate with the plotter. Maybe you run the stock on the tape placement machine then plug into the mould? It’s a synergy of all these assets.
‘The two units join forces when we have projects like Magic Carpet e and Extreme H2O, as we did for projects like My Song, when both sets of expertise are needed. For boats with interiors and systems we generally use our facility in La Spezia. We opened our waterfront yard in 2014.
‘We built the 100ft V, former Tango, in 2017 (she won the Maxi Regatta in the British Virgin Islands in March 2024), then the 145 Kauris IV in 2020 and a 100ft motor yacht Anadyomena in 2021. In La Spezia we have an entire organisation with a team of people who can deliver performance cruising yachts driven by our composite experience and more than just that. Our people in La Spezia can also develop and install systems and interiors and deliver a complete boat.
‘With the Persico Cat 72, for example, we built the seven-metre foils, the two daggerboards and the two rudders with elevators. We use the tape placement machine all the time, for the flat laminate in the stocks of the daggerboards and the rudders, the bulkheads, anywhere we have a lot of layers. It means increased productivity, consistency and quality - the robot won’t leave a piece of plastic in the laminate. At the end it’s cured in the autoclave but you don’t have to do all the debulking that you need to do if you do it manually. Our NDT facility is fundamental to checking the quality at every stage of the process because we don’t want to find out at the end that there are mistakes. The implications in terms of cost and time could be huge.’
1 |Very extreme weight targets were required for Magic Carpet e. Persico has all the skills and all the machinery already in house. 2| T-foil rudder on the Persico Cat 72 Extreme H2O. 3| New CNC milling hub for high-performance composite structures.
‘In both cases, for Extreme H2O and Magic Carpet e, we had very extreme weight targets so we needed to engineer a solution for every element, from the ceiling to the doors, anything to minimise the weight but at the same time leave enough space and features. From the galley to the toilets to the sofa, everything was engineered down to the minimum possible weight. Based on his experience, the designer estimates the boat’s target weight. In the early stages of the project, we discussed this with him to see what was achievable and what wasn’t. We know there are some areas where weight saving is easy, others less so.
‘For example, in both projects the most difficult area to achieve the target was the interiors. We spent most of the time engineering all the elements the owner required to find the lightest possible solution. With these lightweight interiors I would say that we built around 80 per cent of it internally. Most of the panels are composite, we developed the hinges, we developed the ceiling solution, which uses clips to minimise weight. All of it was developed and built internally.
‘We also have an agreement with a yard at Le Grazie, just across the bay from La Spezia, for any after-sales and servicing activity. It’s a nice waterfront set-up with a 200- tonne travel lift and more than five metres of depth. So when a boat comes back for some performance upgrades, to the keel, daggerboard, whatever it is, we do it there. It’s also our base for sea trials. Magic Carpet e was done there, Anadyomena too.’
Cutting-edge yacht construction is Persico’s meat and drink but its expertise with composites has other applications. ‘We’ve been building parts for aerospace projects over the last couple of years,’ adds Persico. ‘We’re developing a reusable spacecraft capsule. We’re also working on different composite structural components for launchers to take satellites into space.’
Nor is its work confined just to composites, as Persico points out. ‘We can also take on pure cruising projects. For example, now we have a 43m aluminium sailing yacht in La Spezia.
‘Obviously this isn’t a composite yacht but the customers still come to us because, after almost 10 year’s experience of making performance cruising yachts, they want our quality and the reliability to deliver these very premium projects. The categories are pure racing machines, America’s Cup yachts, IMOCAs and Maxi72; performance cruisers like Magic Carpet e, Extreme H2O and My Song; and cruising yachts like Kauris IV, Anadyomena, La Toscane and the aluminium yachts.’
How has Persico found himself with such a diverse portfolio of projects? What unites them all? ‘They’re all high-end custom projects,’ he concludes. ‘The point is, if someone is looking for a more traditional fibreglass yacht without a focus on innovation or performance, we might not be the ideal partner. But when a client is seeking a premium, high-end, performance-oriented project – like Extreme H2O, Magic Carpet e or My Song – that’s where we bring real value and are eager to be involved.'
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