Fusion 80 – Gran Turismo Catamaran: A third path
The idea behind the Fusion 80, in the words of the person who set out to build it. Watch our CEO Benoit Lebizay tell the full story in the film above.
Performance you can live with. Design for the Wind.
When we started work on the Fusion 80, we set ourselves a question we had never really asked before.
"We've always built boats that live at the edge of performance, platforms designed first and foremost for speed. With the Fusion 80, we asked ourselves a different question: what if we took everything those boats know about performance and made it fully livable, day to day, over distance?"
The Fusion 80 is our answer, and we call it a Gran Turismo catamaran.
The choice buyers used to face
For years, a large catamaran asked you to choose between two extremes.
"On one side, very generous volumes, comfortable but heavy, leaning hard on the engine the moment the breeze drops. On the other, pure performance boats, fast and demanding, built for sailors who chase sensation above all. Between the two there was almost nothing. That is exactly where we chose to place the Fusion 80."
That gap is where the Gran Turismo catamaran begins.
What Gran Turismo means
The name comes from the car world, and it carries the whole idea.
"A grand tourer has the power of a sports car, yet you can drive it for hours, far, with ease and pleasure. The Fusion 80 is that idea on the water. Real sailing performance, but performance you can live with. We sum it up in two words: Effortless Power."
Effortless Power is the promise behind the boat. The Fusion 80 keeps the sailing power you expect from a Gunboat, and it puts that power at your service rather than asking you to manage it.
Where it sits in the range
The Fusion 80 does not replace our pure performance Gunboats, which remain the fastest and most radical expression of what we do.
"It opens a new branch. It takes the Gunboat DNA, the stiff platform, the hydrodynamics, the command of power, and it turns it towards how you actually use a boat: hosting, voyaging, living aboard for long stretches."
A silhouette that looks fast standing still
You recognise a Fusion before anyone explains it to you.
"It starts with the lines: long, low, sleek. A silhouette that breaks with what an 80-foot catamaran is expected to be."
The flybridge is integrated into the profile rather than perched on top, so the boat stays clean from every angle, open to the sky or sheltered as you wish. There is a lounge in the forward cockpit, a place to settle at sea that boats this size rarely offer, and an owner's cabin with its own private access to the swim platform. In Benoit's words, it is a boat that looks fast standing still, and lives generously once you step aboard.
Performance, measured in time
Performance is the heart of the Fusion 80, and it shows up first where you least expect it.
"The difference shows first in light air, where many large cruisers are still motoring. The Fusion 80 is already sailing. That changes everything."
At ten knots of wind, our modelling shows the Fusion 80 sailing around 95 percent of a passage, where a heavy volume cruiser sails closer to 40 percent and motors the rest. Over a long crossing that becomes hours of extra sailing, in near silence, instead of hours of engine noise. The gain is not really about speed. It is about how much of your time at sea is spent actually sailing.
"High aspect ratio appendages, a very stiff platform, hydrodynamics developed with our naval architects, every detail serves the same goal: turning wind into speed, early and without effort."
We think of this as Power with poise. When the breeze builds, the power is there, and it stays under control rather than turning extreme.
Two ways to live aboard
All that time you gain at sea is time you get to live inside.
"The Fusion 80 doesn't offer one way to live aboard, but several. Modern Living, one open volume, flowing and full of light. Dual Living, two atmospheres within a single space, an open heart of the boat for hosting and a quiet lounge to retreat to."
And we let the boat ask the real question.
"We don't ask owners to tick a box in a catalog. We ask them a question: which of these worlds is yours?"
The essence of it
This is what a Gran Turismo catamaran comes down to.
"Performance doesn't crowd out life on board. It makes it possible. Performance you can live with."
An invitation
The Fusion 80 has its private unveiling at the Cannes Yachting Festival, from 8 to 13 September. Benoit would rather show it to you himself.
"If what I've just described speaks to you, I would like to meet you in person, privately, at this year's Yachting Festival, from 8 to 13 September. We will take our time. That is how we do things."
Before then, you can plot your own passage through our Speed Simulator and see the time you would gain on the routes you sail most often.