Renewed ownership at Uship
Arriving in December 2012 at the head of the Uship deck fitting centre alongside a private investment fund, Stephan Serra announced on 22 February 2021 a reorganisation of the nautical brand's shareholding structure. "The fund with which I arrived in 2012 decided to exit from the capital and we filed a dossier with several employees: Stéphanie Monnier, head of finance management, Jean-Jacques Le Port, head of logistics, Jean-Luc Morvan, head of purchasing and Rémy Baley, head of marketing, as well as several banking and regional investment funds (Editor's note: Ouest Croissance (BPGO), UNEXO (Crédit Agricole), BNP Paribas Développement, SFLD (Société Financière Lorient Développement) and OCTAVE). The choice of continuity led us to prefer our dossier" explains the manager.
Strategic and investment freedom
Stéphan Serra is delighted with the new possibilities opened up by the arrival of the new partners. "This opens up new perspectives. It accelerates current dossiers such as the increase of our stocks and storage capacities, possibly through new buildings, and also the recruitment of human reinforcements in the short term as we started in logistics. The strategic advisory meeting in April will help us to see things more clearly, but all projects are on the table, whether for internal or external growth. The arrival of bank funds gives us a greater capacity to finance future projects and a greater degree of freedom," he stresses.
Maintain the growth of the hardware store network
Convinced of the importance of physical shops, Stephan Serra intends to maintain its growth rate. "The network is growing by 10% a year. We have the will to continue like this, even if the objective is not to add more points on the map to say we are the biggest. We've even eliminated points in recent years that didn't correspond to our wishes. We are already ultra-present in France on the coast. There's something to do on fresh water. The international scene is very vast and we have a lot of contacts in progress. The objective is to strengthen our position with players already present, dealers or companies in the sector already established.
A broad vision of boating
The attractiveness of the coastline in 2021 seems to be a given for the president of Uship. We've taken a big step towards nautical leisure activities in the new catalogue, with a wingfoil for the first time, plenty of room for board sports, paddle, wake and an even more beautiful share of fishing. We are extremely confident. Guests will be coming to the waterfront very early this year, not being able to go skiing. We can already see it" concludes Stephan Serra.
