Columbia Cruise Services told Seatrade Cruise News it has ‘won the tender process for the full management services’ of Satoshi and is working on the ship’s takeover, scheduled for early November. Columbia’s Olaf Groeger said his company will be the ‘partner behind the scenes for this exciting and unique project,’ and looks forward to supporting the operating company Viva Vivas, a spinoff of Ocean Builders.
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· O c t o b e r 2 6 a t 3 : 1 7 P M ·
The ministry of tourism and the Panama Marine Authority came to visit the factory this weekend.
They are excited about jump starting the Blue Economy with Ocean Builders.
The MS Satoshi project is dead as the former Pacific Dawn has been sold for scrap, according to a statement from Ocean Builders, which was aiming to setup a floating tech hub for small businesses with the aim to support crypto currency off the coast of Panama.
After buying the ship, hiring a vessel management company and even completing a class drydocking, the company said they had hit an insurance roadblock.
The ship has since quickly been sold to scrap and will sail to India.
“After an exhaustive search for an International Group P&I Club insurance group to insure the Satoshi we have hit the roadblock of having no insurance company willing to insure the MS Satoshi upon dropping anchor in the Gulf of Panama,” read a statement from Ocean Builders. “The closest we came was a company toying with us with a million dollar premium for a maximum of $5 million in coverage. Nothing close to the coverage we would need to be legally compliant. We did not foresee that the big boys club would be against such a small operation such as ours.”
The company had opened bidding on cabins for residency in November and has promised refunds.
“We had requested from the Panama Marine Authority to be considered a non-seagoing vessel which likely would have lessened our burden for insurance, eliminating the requirement to comply with about 32 of the 35 international maritime treaties which Panama has agreed to. However they came back letting us know that because we have an engine and we have a flag, we are to be considered seagoing,” the company wrote.
"While we could have spent months and millions of dollars fighting, lobbying (see: bribing), or coming up with some complex alternative insurance solution to comply with the laws, we just did not have the support from the very communities which we created this project to support. Namely the seasteading community and the Bitcoin community. On the contrary, we were constantly attacked by the very people that we were trying to help.
“With so many roadblocks ahead of us with the insurance being a show stopper and no support behind us, it is with a heavy heart that we have decided to sell the MS Satoshi and go back to focusing on our floating homes here in Panama.”