Last April, Thomas Duhen took over the reins of the Archambault shipyard, already in receivership at the time. This expatriate, well acquainted with the American and Brazilian markets for which he had developed a multi-brand import-export business in the yachting sector, took over a fragile business at the time. At this time (April 2014), the shipyard has a few orders and still has 11 employees, including the two Archambault brothers, sons of the shipyard's founder over 50 years ago.
But the good results of the brand new A13 Teasing Machine helmed by Eric de Turkheim's at the Commodores Cup didn't seem to be enough to turn the shipyard's fortunes around.
Unless the design and production of this model, the flagship of the range launched by Gilles Caminade, the previous owner, were too heavy an investment?
Contacted by telephone, Archambault staff can only confirm this turnaround and assert that they are still in daily contact by e-mail with shareholder Thomas Duhan, who is currently abroad. We have tried to contact him via this channel, but to date there has been no response.
