Swedish mastermind

Atlant's Richard Brisius on sponsorship, trimaran racing in the Baltic and the Archipelago Raid

With major support from companies such as Volvo, Nokia and Swedish Match Sweden is currently one of the world’s most mature markets when it comes to the union of the yacht racing and corporate worlds. One company leading this particular brand of match making is Stockholm-based company Atlant.

Atlant was set up five years ago by Johan Salén and Richard Brisius (right), both of whom were at the time working on the successful Team EF program, that ultimately won the 1997-8 Whitbread. Salén was the EF campaign’s CEO, Brisius its shore manager. During that race Brisius says he and Salén were mulling over what they should do next: “Should we quit the sailing business or what shall we do? We realised we had the same vision and idea of how to continue if we were to continue in sailing.”

At this time Brisius had 10 years of experience in yacht racing having sailed the 1989/90 Whitbread on the Italian maxi Gatorade and the next race on Brooksfield shoehorning in an America’s Cup campaign in between as bowman for Tre Kronor. He also has a strong entrepreneurial streak. “I started my first company when I was 12, selling junk, like old lawnmowers - you find one on the street, you fix it up and sell it. Then I had an animal farm - I set it up in my garden with a little hut with rabbits and mice! But I had to sell those. And then for three years we printed clothes at night when we were not in school and then when we were meant to be in school we slept. Then I had a clothing shop…” Since then he has acquired a masters degree in business studies.

Salén was originally a world champion windsurfer before he took up sailing, racing with Roger Nilson on the maxi ketch The Card in the 1989/90 Whitbread during which he met Brisius. In the following Whitbread he was head of the Intrum Justitia campaign.

The reasons for creating Atlant were simple, as Brisius explains. “As sailing is growing as a commercial sport, there is a need for a company that understands both the sports side of it and what a company’s needs are and that could also provide some continuity for companies and sailors, because we were fed up with running projects and seeing them die and all their assets and knowledge disappearing and then you spend a year rebuilding the whole thing.”

Atlant’s first project was to buy one of Philippe Poupon’s 60ft Fleury Michon trimarans. They found a sponsor - First Hotels - and raced her in as many events as they could around the Baltic. As this was happening they were pounding the corporate boardrooms searching for money for a Volvo Ocean Race campaign. With the profile gained from EF and subsequently First Hotels they were able to pitch to Swedish lock giant Assa Abloy.

At the time Assa Abloy had been going through an intense period of international acquisition, including the American lock maker Yale, and wanted to draw all their new companies into their corporate fold. The round the world race proved a perfect opportunity for the company to promote their brand values to their subsiduaries dotted around the world and using the race as a vehicle they were able to achieve this over a much faster time frame than they would otherwise have done (read more about this here).

Atlant also set up was the Match Cup, now called the SAP Match Cup, a corporate match racing championship held in Volvo Ocean 60s and now into its fourth year. “They really like it,” says Brisius. “Last year there were 22 teams. They come for one week and race against two other teams for half a day and if they win they continue. We put two guys on the boat, but they are not allowed to do anything.” The project is managed within Atlant by Swedish match racer Bjorn Hansen, which is typical of the Atlant structure - each project has its own team which works solely on that project.

One of Atlant’s more interesting projects is the Archipelago Raid, a charge around the stunning Finniash and Swedish archipelago to the east of Stockholm in F18 catamarans. This was the brainchild of Salén’s wife, former EF Education skipper Christine Guillou. “She saw the archipelago and thought it would be a great place to have an event on the Raid Gauloises concept,” says Brisius.



The Archipelago Raid is a unique event involving almost non-stop sailing - roughly 20-22 hours per day for four days. “You sail and sail,” says Brisius. “The first 24-30 hours you sail non-stop.” Anyone who has sailed an F18 will understand how arduous a prospect this is.

Prior to the start, competitors are given 100 waypoints which can be used in the race. These are plugged into a waterproof GPS and the route is made up on the hoof by Guillou and her race team. Along the course there are gates and checkpoints and Atlant run a lot of security boats to keep track of their fleet. “At some checkpoints there is a gate,” says Brisius. “If you come in 1 hour after the leader then you have to miss the next checkpoint to catch up with the fleet, so the fleet stays very tight which makes it more exciting.”

This year top international names within the sailing world, such as Ellen MacArthur and the McDonalds took part and the event resulted in two prime time slots on Sweden’s primary terrestrial TV station.

Ironically Brisius says that Atlant’s primary interest is running teams and not event organising. They have been forced into this role due to a lack of good sailing events in Scandinavia.

As a result Atlant’s main project is the Nokia Oops Cup, a series for their fleet of three 60ft trimarans – all of them 10-15 year old boats from the French circuit. This circuit is now three seasons old and which grew from their original First Hotels project. “The whole vision of it is to be the main sailing event in the Nordic countries in terms of being a great sporting event with professional teams and to deliver good value for the sponsors,” says Brisius.

The three boats currently taking part in the Oops Cup championship are the Danish boat Nokia, Klabbe Nylof’s HiQ and Atlant’s own Gore-Tex campaigned by Swedish sailing star Magnus Olssen (below). Contrary to popular misconception, Olsson is not formally part of Atlant, although he has been central to many of their campaigns particularly the three hulled ones and Assa Abloy.



The schedule for the Nokia Oops Cup has been dictated by the fact that most of the sponsors involved run budgets for all Scandinavia. “Nokia for instance, one region is Sweden, Norway, Denmark. Accentureand several other companies are organised the same way with one guy deciding on that area. So that is neat for such a project,” says Brisius. Thus the Oops Cup includes special grand prix held in the capital cities of those countries along with major local races such as the Gotland Rund.

Currently Brisius says they are scratching their heads trying to work out what to do next with the Oops Cup. Their 60ft trimarans are very exciting and deliver exceptional value for the sponsors involved, but are getting old and two of the boats have suffered severe breakages this season. Brisius is currently looking at his options to replace this fleet. “We would like to race new boats. The best option would be to have five one design tris around 60ft but that would probably cost too much. The reality is you have to stick to what companies can afford. Also we don’t want to make the boats the stars. We want to make them as equal as possible and try to have really good crew.”

Obviously it is hoped that one day the Oops Cup boats might try their hand against the technologically more advanced 60ft trimarans on the French ORMA circuit. “Three or four years ago we talked a lot to them,” admits Brisius. “The ORMA circuit is very good with the TV production and the boats are great even if they are a bit too open and too costly.”

However he says at present there is as little reason to take the Oops Cup to France as there is for the ORMA fleet to visit Scandinavia. “It is not a natural thing for them to go abroad as 90% of their sponsors only have interests in France so they say “why should we go to Scandinavia?” So they have painted themselves into a corner because if it only works in one country you are stuck there - you can’t move it and that is where we risk ending up with the Nokia Oops Cup - it will only be in the Nordic countries, and we can’t move it out. The event takes place in one region: where the sponsors come from.”

In part two of this interview tomorrow Richard Brisius explains why the sponsorship market in yacht racing is so buoyant in Sweden and gives his views about the Volvo Ocean Race