Reimagining the possibilities within luxury yachting and chartering
Team lead
Rami Al-Bakri
Director & Co-Founder
Team
1x Programme Manager
1x Product Owner
2x Designers
2x Full-Stack Engineers
1x Marketeer
Services
Venture design and build, product, design, engineering, marketing, growth hacking and analytics
Technology
Various low-code platforms, Javascript and 3rd party integrations
Industry
Luxury, Shipping, Marketplaces
Length of project
Predicted length of 10 months from start of product to launch.
Overview
This is an end-to-end venture build. From proposition design to the overall system design, Underdawgs have completed everything.
This includes but is not limited to the public website, chat bots, CRM, the main product, transactional emails and sms’, analytics plus venture design and staffing.
The Brief
In July 2022, our client approached us with the insight that the yachting industry was due to be upended by technology. He wanted to take the reins of this change rather than be affected by it.
His goals? To drastically reduce fees, whilst improving the chartering experience.
Our client’s concept was a platform made for every stakeholder of the chartering process, from owner, to charterer, to crew.
With current platforms, communication between stakeholders is lengthy and inefficient. This is because communication is split across multiple messaging platforms, with stakeholders only being able to message people individually. With Sundeck, a central hub of communication is created. Now, all messages are in one place, and every stakeholder is contactable. As a result, communication is traceable and seamless.
What’s more, the total digitalisation of the chartering process means that owners fees drop from 20% to 10%. On a £1 million charter, this means an overnight saving of £100,000 for the yacht owner.
With Sundeck, we are implementing technology that means all lines of communication between stakeholders are more efficient, transparent and instant than before, making life easier for every stakeholder. In doing this, fees are lowered, as the manual element of chartering has been removed.
Key Problems
Charting the Route to Launch
When we first spoke to our client, he presented us with a research project from a tier 1 consultancy firm, providing a quote of £7 million to launch the business. We agreed that we could launch the business for a cost that’s 10x lower by utilising the Underdawgs principles.
We started by producing a proof of value; this is how we kick-off any project with a new client. This showed we were capable of building what he needed and allowed him to raise his seed round on the back of having a fixed cost rate, and a comprehensive team in place.
At Underdawgs, our intention is always to launch as quickly as possible. However, given that Sundeck’s audience are ultra high-net-worth individuals, our version 1 had to be extremely polished. To appeal to some of the world’s richest people, naturally, the site had to be fully featured and highly sophisticated. For this reason, the end-to-end process took longer than is typical at Underdawgs.
Diverse personas share a unified experience
One of the core challenges of this project is the need to appeal to the 8 different personas existent within the chartering process. Our goal was to engineer unique functions that would suit the needs of each persona.
Looking beyond the horizon with Sundeck
The beta launches 3Q23 and the public launch is predicted for late January 2024. Post launch, we will be focused on building traction whilst continually improving the core product we’ve built.
One eye will always be kept on the future of Sundeck, with plans for line extension and entry into sub-markets within the wider yachting industry in place, through expansion of our product offerings.
For us, the upcoming launch of Sundeck marks the beginning of a long-term relationship with the founders.