It’s not news that the uber-rich billionaires of the world are exploring Space as an investment opportunity. It’s also not news that there is a rivalry for Space domination between Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, two of the wealthiest people on Earth. Richard Branson also has his hat in the ring, albeit on the edge of the ring.
Musk, the head of SpaceX, Tesla, and now Twitter, wants to colonise Mars. Whereas, Amazon and Blue Origin founder Bezos is seeking to establish an industrial base in Space and Virgin Group founder Branson wants to dominate Space tourism.
But not every billionaire is looking at the sky as the final frontier. Ray Dalio is symbolically looking to dive into oceans for a treasure hunt as monetary tightening slows down the growth engines of the world economy.
Dalio, the founder of Bridgewater Associates, the world’s largest hedge fund, has invested in a company that builds submarines for the super-rich and helps them explore the remotest parts of the planet. According to a report in the Financial Times, Dalio, along with renowned Hollywood filmmaker James Cameron, is now a part-owner of Florida-based Triton Submarines.
“If you’re just going on a yacht in some fancy place, that’s one thing. If instead you’re on a yacht and you can go down and explore, first of all the trip is going to be better and also it encourages exploration,” Dalio told FT.
The financial details of the deal are not known.
Ultra-luxury submersible
Triton Submarines was founded in 2007 by Patrick Lahey and Bruce Jones to manufacture submersibles for yacht owners. The company designs and manufactures submersibles for research, filming, deep-ocean exploration, and the luxury yachting and tourism sector.
Triton makes about four or five vehicles per year and has a waiting list for its vessels.
Huge price tag
The price of the vessels varies from model range to capacity. The submarines have a base price tag of $2.5 million and this can go all the way up to $40 million. The range in carrying capacity is from one person to 66 persons and can deep dive from 100 meters to full ocean depth.
Deep dive
One of Triton’s vessels, the TRITON 36000/2, is the world’s first and only manned submersible certified to go down to the ocean floor.
"It opens up to repeatable exploration the 70% of the world’s oceans hitherto beyond the reach of mankind," the company claims.
The TRITON 36000/2 is self-rescuing in nature and is designed to return to the surface no matter the scenario.
Why go to Space?
Talking about his new pursuits, Dalio says that ocean exploration is much more exciting and important than Space exploration.
"You’re not going to see any aliens in outer space but you will see aliens underneath," he says.
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