Bimare Right of Reply request

This text below was sent along a legal theat menace on not publishing it. Of course they would have been given the space the same, as I ‘ve been doing with Bimare, A-Classic new formed Class, Petrucci’s letters and Stunt 9 exposure. Will comment later on this.
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Text sent by Valerio Petrucci
Being BIMARE the obvious and incontrovertible target of Mr. Niggeler’s defamatory statements, I, Valerio Petrucci, as partner of BIMARE Catamarans, want to point out the following:

-Point 1: Bimare Catamarans never “pushed” to promote the split of IACA or the Italian A class association. BIMARE simply chose to stand next to a significant number of A cat owners, who reacted to a blatant misuse of class rules, which had put them out of play. Bimare boatyard subsequently took note of the chaos caused by the total lack of control over rules, and mindful of
what happened in the past with regard to the minimum weight issue, decided not to follow the foiling “path”, in order to cooperate to re-establish a fair level of competition in A class events. So Bimare, being in total agreement with the protests of a part of the fleet, has simply followed his own ideas, just as it has done any other manufacturer. Anyway concerns about class management are spread also in countries where BIMARE hasn’t any factory

-Point 2: Mr. Niggeler’s speculations about the attempt of BIMARE to promote the constitution of an one design class in the 90’s are as inaccurate as tendentious. In those years, BIMARE was by far the biggest manufacturer of A class catamarans. As it has often happened in many class of sailing boats, a few owners of BIMARE A-cats met together to form a class in order to escape the old problem of the fickle rules and escalating costs of A Class. Our boatyard had no reason not to consider the proposal, since every company is on the market to make money and this could have stabilized the market and increased our sales. So we do not understand what appears odd to Mr. Niggeler! They were indeed A class members but also and above all BIMARE customers! Today picture with regard to the UACC is not even comparable. The UACC is an independent class where anyone can build a boat. Our boatyard has no more involvement in it than any others.

-Point 3: Bimare is criticized by Mr. Niggeler for not wanting to invest in technology. At this regard let us underline that BIMARE is the oldest manufacturer of A class catamaran still alive worldwide. We would like to explain you the reason for this long life: if we had worked as the other boatyards that have come and gone, focusing solely on the investments in technology, we would certainly have closed a long time ago too! All the hyper-technological boatyards which entered the difficult and controversial A class market went burst within a few years. We are talking about dozens of manufacturers which went bankrupt during our 40 year long story. The willingness to invest or not depends always from what you expect as a return: on the basis of our experience we are aware of the fact that a rapid upgrade of materials/technologies increases production and sale costs and spreads turbolences in the market, which turns into a double loss:

+ COSTS and –SALES = BANKRUPT!
Anyway we would like to make you known that one of the more efficient and advanced flying catamaran marketed nowadays, the S 9 designed by Michele Petrucci, is fully built (from the most “poor” parts to the ones which come out from the factory autoclave in high modulus carbon) at BIMARE loft.

We have nothing to add about Mr. Niggeler statements. Our personal advice, after 40 years of A class, is to listen to genuine people, who work for the community and not for themselves or one part of it, and above all to work to give a serious and stable rule to the class!

The rules create the stability that gives confidence to the market!
Make sure that the A class remains the cradle of technological development but first think to the people and then to technology.

Hoping not to be forced to do again in the future such an unpleasant thing

Valerio Petrucci
BIMARE Catamarans
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