Nautitech in “Redressement Judiciaire”

“Redressement Judiciaire” in French law is “court‑supervised restructuring” or “court‑supervised receivership”.
It is similar to Chapter 11 in the US or “Under Administration” in the UK.

This article is based on public filings and published trade reporting, current as of 4 September 2026. Insolvency proceedings move quickly and the position may have changed since. Financial figures are drawn from Nautitech’s filed annual accounts; all percentages, comparisons and per-boat estimates are our own arithmetic and are identified in the text. Sections covering the likelihood of a sale, potential buyers and competitive positioning are our opinion, not reported fact. Nothing here is legal, financial or investment advice. Anyone with a deposit or a build contract at risk should take advice from a qualified French insolvency lawyer.

What the Accounts Show

On 7 August 2026 the Tribunal de Commerce de La Rochelle opened redressement judiciaire proceedings against Nautitech Catamarans. This is not liquidation. The yard is still building boats, still delivering them, and still taking the Nautitech 41 Type S to La Rochelle this month and Southampton in October for test sails (but they are not exhibiting at any boat shows).

The closest scenario in the US would be Chapter 11. In the UK you’d describe this as “being under administration” but note that the law is different in all 3 cases which mostly reflects the timing and friendliness to debtors. French law applies here of course.

So what is happening? Eighteen months ago the Nautitech 48 Open was named European Yacht of the Year 2025 in the multihull category. The range has just been fully renewed. They have just relaunched the entry level yacht, now called the Nautuech 41 Type S. The order book runs to summer 2027 on some models.

So what’s the story? The filed accounts hint at what is going on behind the scenes. Here is what they show, what they do not show, and what we think the future holds for this French brand.

What the court ordered

The BODACC notice (Bodacc A n°20260153, annonce n°3564, published 13 August 2026) records the following:

The Tribunal de Commerce de La Rochelle opened redressement judiciaire against Nautitech Catamarans SAS on 7 August 2026. SCP CBF Associés, in the person of Thibaut Patard-Piedmont, was appointed administrateur judiciaire with a mission to assist the debtor in all acts of management, not to replace management. SELARL EKIP’, in the person of Maître Marie-Adéline Rousselot-Gégoué, was appointed mandataire judiciaire. The court opened a six-month observation period and set the date of cessation of payments at 15 July 2026.

Two points are important for anyone who has ordered a boat. Under French law, contracts in force continue through the observation period, so existing build contracts stand. Debts incurred before the opening of the procedure are frozen, and creditors had two months from publication to file claims. The freeze falls hardest on suppliers and subcontractors, whose receivables are now locked while they are still expected to deliver.

Nothing has been publicly stated about warranty cover or the treatment of customer stage payments.

The Numbers

The financial figures below comes from the filed annual accounts of CIM Nautitech Catamarans, SIREN 379 124 779, registered at Rochefort and filed at the greffe of La Rochelle. NB: Nautitech’s financial year ends on 31 July. So “FY2025” means the twelve months to 31 July 2025, filed in January 2026 and gazetted in May 2026. The decrease in the numbers is older than the court date suggests.

Revenue

Revenue was €25.3m in FY2022, €30.3m in FY2023, €22.5m in FY2024 and €18.8m in FY2025.

That is growth of 21.0% then 19.6%, followed by falls of 25.7% and 16.7%. From the FY2023 peak to FY2025, Nautitech lost just under 38% of its turnover in two years. Roughly €13.1m of the FY2025 figure, about 70%, was export.

Earnings

EBE, the French gross operating surplus (the closest thing to EBITDA), was €1.95m in 2022, €2.74m in 2023, €1.52m in 2024 and €536k in 2025. From peak to FY2025 that is a fall of about 80%, against a 38% fall in sales. The EBE margin went from 9.0% to 2.9%.

The operating result went from €1.48m in FY2023 to minus €118k in FY2025. Net result went from a €1.37m profit to a €219k loss, a swing of around €1.59m.

But, the gross margin rate held up. It ran 50.4%, 50.8%, 55.9% and 53.4%. Nautitech was not selling boats too cheaply. It was selling too few of them to service the yard costs.

The fixed costs.

Payroll including social charges was €5.64m (2022), €6.64m (2023), €5.73m (2024) and €5.09m (2025). So, in absolute terms the yard cut its costs. But, as a share of revenue costs went up: 22.3%, 21.9%, 25.4%, 27.1%. Registered headcount for FY2025 was 114.

The money left after bought-in goods and services, fell from €9.99m in FY2023 to €5.96m in FY2025. Against a €5.09m payroll, there is not much left to cover anything else.

The yard does not become 38% cheaper to run because you sold 38% fewer catamarans. The building, the moulds, the engineering team, the dealer support and the after-sales obligation all remain. Resin and parts are variable, that’s about it.

Debt was not the Issue

Financial debt fell from €11.8m in FY2022 to €4.4m in FY2025. Equity rose from €1.45m to €3.18m. The financial autonomy ratio improved from 6% to 27.4%. The balance sheet got healthier every year right up to the filing.

Cash tells another story. It fell from €11.0m to €3.02m over the same period. Nautitech repaid roughly €7.4m of financial debt and lost roughly €8m of cash. The deleveraging was largely funded out of the buffer. Self-financing capacity fell from €3.27m in FY2023 to €933k in FY2025. Leverage measured as net financial debt to EBITDA went from 0.4x to 2.6x, not because debt rose but because EBITDA nearly disappeared.

ActuNautique reports that the loan behind the range renewal was repaid in full in May 2026, two months before the cessation of payments date. Management framed that as the completion of an investment cycle.

The working capital trap

Nautitech ran negative working capital throughout, which is normal in boatbuilding: customer deposits and stage payments arrive before the yard pays for the build. Operating working capital was minus 47.6 days of revenue in FY2022, minus 20.3 in FY2023, minus 1.1 in FY2024 and minus 6.9 in FY2025.

But that funding line was in decline. In FY2022 customers were financing about seven weeks of turnover. By FY2024 they were financing almost nothing. Fewer boats in build means fewer deposits in hand, and the yard has to fund the gap from its own pocket. Stock as a share of revenue also decreased, from 46 days in FY2024 to 14 days in FY2025, which is consistent with a yard running its inventory down to release cash.

A €219k loss is not a serious long term problem. A €3m cash balance, a €5m payroll and a reduction of customer-funded working capital, with a shareholder who will not tide things over is a problem thogh. That is cessation des paiements, and on 15 July 2026, that is what happened.

The Shareholder

Nautitech has belonged to Bavaria since 2014. When the Berlin fund Capital Management Partners acquired Bavaria Yachtbau out of insolvency in September 2018, the French catamaran yard came with it, but it was ringfenced as a seperate entity. The register still lists Bavaria Yachtbau Holding GmbH as président of Nautitech Catamarans, with Gildas Le Masson as directeur général. CMP is the ultimate owner, not the direct registered shareholder.

ActuNautique, which broke the story on 11 August 2026, is blunt about the reasons: CMP did not wish to participate in the recapitalisation the yard needed. The redressement judiciaire is the legal framework for changing the shareholder while the business keeps trading. French industry coverage frames the procedure as capital-driven rather than industrial.

That tallies with the accounts. A yard with €4.4m of financial debt, €3.18m of equity and a full order book does not normally end up in front of a commercial court. It ended up there because the owner closed the cheque book.

The Strategy that Led Here

In 2020 Nautitech made a deliberate decision to withdraw from the charter fleet market and concentrate on owner boats. The charter market runs on volume and heavily negotiated prices, and it is dominated by Lagoon, Bali and Fountaine Pajot. Nautitech chose fewer boats at higher value instead.

Unit output, as reported by ActuNautique: 58 catamarans in 2023, 30 in 2024, 24 in 2025, with 18 planned for 2026 of which 13 had been sold by the end of July. Set against the revenue line, average revenue per boat rose from roughly €520k to roughly €780k. Note, the financial years end in July and the output figures are calendar years, so the two do not line up so this is an estimate.

The strategy was well thought out, but the timing was unfortunate. Nautitech halved its volume into a market that then halved again on its own, and did so while the competition heated up in its segment. ActuNautique suggests discounts of up to 30% in the sporty, no-daggerboard catamaran market as builders cleared post-Covid stock. Nautitech was constrained by its balance sheet to match that.

Will CMP Sell the Business, and to whom?

CMP bought Bavaria in September 2018, an eight-year hold for a fund that describes itself as a specialist in special situations and turnarounds. Eight years is long, and funds have finite lives. The refusal to recapitalise reads less like a judgement on Nautitech and more like a decision about where CMP wants its remaining capital. They are likely looking for higher returns elsewhere.

Regarding the asset: a buyer would get a freshly renewed three-model range, an EYOTY-winning 48, a brand with 35 years of standing, roughly 114 skilled people at Rochefort, an order book with visibility into summer 2027, at a distressed price. Under a plan de cession the buyer takes the assets and contracts it wants and leaves the frozen pre-procedure liabilities behind. On paper this is an attractive package.

So our best guess is that CMB sells Nautitech, but not necessarily inside the initial six-month window. French observation periods are renewable up to 18 months, and a court will normally extend rather than liquidate a business with a live order book. We would put outright liquidation at low probability and a sale at better than even odds, with the real risk being price rather than interest. The party most likely to feel the pain is the supplier base.

On the potential candidates:

• Grand Large Yachting The best strategic fit. GLY has built its portfolio almost entirely by acquiring respected brands in difficulty: Outremer in 2007, Garcia in 2010, Gunboat in 2016, RM Yachts in 2020, Marsaudon Composites and ORC in 2023. Nautitech would slot underneath Outremer at a price point GLY does not currently serve, and Rochefort is an hour from La Rochelle where RM already sits. The question is their ability to fund another purchase mid-downturn. GLY is private and does not publish group accounts.
• A family or industrial investor from outside boatbuilding. The Hanse Yachts example, where Andreas Müller and then-CEO Hanjo Runde took Aurelius out in summer 2025. Nautitech is small enough that a single wealthy backer could do it. This is the outcome that most often follows a private equity exit from a mid-sized European yard.
• Fountaine Pajot. They are twenty minutes up the road at Aigrefeuille-d’Aunis, with roughly €323m of group revenue, and no true performance-cruiser brand in its stable. Industrially logical. Against it: FP is digesting Dufour, trading through a soft market, and may see more value in defending its own brands than in adding more of a niche brand. But a Nautitech purchase would give them another arrow in their quiver when competiting against the Beneteau Group who produce Lagoon and the sportier Excess.
• Catana Group. Has the scale, but Bali’s whole proposition is the opposite of Nautitech’s, and they are more likely to invest in their Catana brand which has sat on the sidelines for a while. Also, Catana is dealing with the aftermath of the July 2026 fire at Canet-en-Roussillon. We would be surprised.
• Groupe Beneteau. Unlikely. Beneteau already operates in this segment with Excess Catamarans, has invested in product renewal rather than going doen the acquisition route.

One note worth mentioning. When Bavaria was sold out of insolvency in 2018, French coverage at the time reported that a pledge over the Nautitech shares complicated the disposal of the French subsidiary. We have no evidence that still exists (or if it ever did). But the ownership structure has previously slowed a sale, and the shares are still held through a German holding company.

Has Excess taken Nautitech’s market?

The temptation is to draw a connection from Excess’s rise to Nautitech’s revenue chart. But that is probably oversimplifying things.

Groupe Beneteau launched Excess in 2019, initially with the 12 and 15 built on modified Lagoon mouldings, then launched the Excess 11 in 2021 and the Excess 14 in 2022 as new designs, followed by the Marc Lombard-designed Excess 13 in 2025. The 13 took Best Family Cruising Yacht at Düsseldorf and was nominated for European Yacht of the Year 2026. Beneteau’s brief for the brand is to sit between comfort-first cruising cats and performance multihulls, with two aft helms and a lighter fit-out. That is similar to the ground Nautitech has occupied since the Open 40.

Beneteau’s group numbers show the pressure and their firepower. FY2025 revenue was €848.6m, down 18%, with the sailing division down 26.6% and demand from charter professionals down 38%. H1 2026 revenue came in at €452.3m, up 12%, with multihull sailing revenue up 8% in a contracting market, which the group attributes in part to the Lagoon 38 and Excess 13. Beneteau runs 16 production sites, nine brands and around 135 models on roughly €850m of annual revenue.

We do not know how much of that multihull growth is Excess and how much is Lagoon. Beneteau does not disclose brand-level splits.

But, Excess does not need to outsell Nautitech to hurt it. Excess needs only to exist inside a group that can develop a new model across shared resources, shared purchasing, a 230-dealer network and a charter channel along with Lagoon that dampens the troughs when owner demand softens. Nautitech, operating alone at 24 boats a year, has to recoup its 41 Type S development cost from a much smaller base. Beneteau can develop the Excess 13 with the knowledge that the group sells over €800m of boats.

But, of course, additional competition in the market is bound to affect pricing. Counter-intuitively, Beneteau have probably increased the the overall size of this market segment, but Nautitech have lost share.

One interesting note to point out though: when CMB bought Bavaria (and Nautitech with it) in 2018, Excess Catamarans didn’t exist. There was no real competition in their market segment apart from perhaps Seawind. When CMB drew up their SWOT analysis this year, Lagoon’s entry had moved from the Threat quadrant into the Weakness quadrant.

Wedged between two poles: is the niche too small?

The sailing catamaran market has hardened into two commercially coherent ends.

At one end sit the volume builders: Lagoon, Bali, Robertson & Caine and Fountaine Pajot. Their economics are built around fleet buyers, long runs and a residual value that charter management underwrites. Volume softens the volatility.

At the other sit the performance bluewater yards and the luxury boats: Outremer, Gunboat, ORC, Balance, HH, Catana for the bluewater boats and the likes of Sunreef, Fountaine Pajot and Lagoon on the luxury end. They sell fewer boats at higher prices to owners who have decided that sailing performance or high luxury is the point. An Outremer 48 lists at €1.19m ex VAT. Boutique volumes work better when you charge boutique prices.

Nautitech is positioned between them: no daggerboards, aft helms, a boat that sails well but costs a good deal less than an Outremer and offers less absolute volume than a Lagoon. It is a good place to be as a sailor. It is a difficult place to be as a business, because it needs volume economics at a price that will not support boutique margins.

Our view is that the middle is a viable product position and a more volatile corporate one. It works as a brand inside a group that can share industrial cost, purchasing and distribution. It struggles as a standalone factory employing 114 people at 24 hulls a year. Excess proves the first half of that. Nautitech’s accounts prove the second.

So: is the niche too small? Not for the boats. There are clearly enough owners who want a sporty, sail-first cruising cat that Nautitech built 58 of them in 2023 and won the multihull class of the industry’s most serious award. The increased risk comes with carrying the full industrial overhead alone in a slow market, at a price point that competitors will discount by 30%.

So we thinks the most likely good outcome for Nautitech is a new owner with bigger pockets, or a much lower fixed cost base (think of Seawind with their yards in Vietnam and Turkey). Thatis also the outcome that would save the most jobs, so fingers crossed.

What to watch

The observation period runs to early February 2027 unless extended. Watch out for the number and shape of offers, whether they are plan de cession bids for the assets or a plan de continuation with new capital, and whether any bidder commits to the full workforce.

Nautitech is not exhibiting at the Cannes Yachting Festival, which runs from 8 to 13 September 2026. The yard was present in 2023, 2024 and 2025. Cannes carries the highest stand costs in the European calendar, so skipping it is a sensible move for a business under court supervision. It still means the Mediterranean shop window is shuttered this season.

And watch how the administrator treats customer deposits on boats in build.

Figures circulating elsewhere

• A revenue figure of €20,956,800 for FY2024 has appeared in coverage, described as the most recently published. The filed accounts show €22.5m for FY2024, and the FY2025 accounts showing €18.8m were filed in January 2026 and gazetted on 2 May 2026. We could not reconcile €20,956,800 with any figure in the register and have not used it.
• A claim that ten boats have been sold this year, four delivered and six in build, appears to refer to the first four Nautitech 41 Type S deliveries. The reported 2026 programme is 18 units with 13 sold by the end of July.
• Sale-process details reported elsewhere (99 employees, an €18.767m turnover figure and a 18 September deadline for offers) we have not been able to locate in a primary source. The turnover figure is consistent with FY2025 rounding. The headcount conflicts with the registered figure of 114 and the declared bracket of 100 to 199 employees.

Sources

Filed annual accounts of CIM Nautitech Catamarans, SIREN 379 124 779, financial years to 31 July, as republished from BODACC and INPI filings. BODACC A n°20260153, annonce n°3564, 13 August 2026. ActuNautique, “Nautitech: un redressement judiciaire pour changer d’actionnaire”, 11 August 2026, updated 14 August 2026. Multicoques Mag, “Nautitech en redressement judiciaire”, August 2026. Groupe Beneteau FY2025 revenue release, 9 February 2026, and H1 2026 revenue release, 27 July 2026. European Yacht of the Year 2025 results. HanseYachts AG press release as reported by segeln, 28 August 2026.

Growth rates, margin percentages, the peak-to-trough calculations and the per-boat revenue estimates are our own arithmetic applied to those published figures. The assessment of sale prospects, potential buyers and competitive positioning is our opinion and is identified as such in the text.