CEOs Fight to Rule the High Seas

Imagine yourself cruising the high seas in a lavish, super-secret, ocean-faring vessel complete with a remote controlled undersea rover, a 12-man submersible, a recording studio and a personal crew of 60, including several former Navy Seals.

No, you are not 007's nemesis in an upcoming James Bond flick. You're aboard Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen's $200 million dollar private yacht.

At 416 foot, the Octopus is just one of Allen's three superyachts--he also has the 301ft Tatoosh and the 198 ft Medusa-- but it is undoubtedly the pride of the fleet, designed to be the largest yacht in the world, an unabashed celebration of maritime largesse.

And much to Allen's delight it achieved this honour; that is until his arch rival, Oracle founder Larry Ellison, came along. The two have been locked in software development competition for years and it seems that this rivalry extends far beyond the workplace.

In fact, according to the U.S. Power and Motor Yacht, Ellison's yacht was under construction about the same time as Allen's. But Ellison's original design, which on paper was a few feet shorter that Allen's, subsequently ended up being a dozen feet longer when Ellison caught wind of Allen's exact yacht specifications.

The result is the 452 ft Rising Sun, a reported $250 million dollar megayacht  which has 82 rooms spread out over five stories and a staggering 86,000 square feet of living space, roughly the size of an average Wal-Mart.

Whereas Allen's Octopus is the rugged Land Rover of the high seas (its high bow allowing for better handling in rough seas and icy waters), Rising Sun is more like the plush caddy. With its low, elegant profile it boasts vast crystal chandeliers, onyx counter tops, a myriad of specialty chefs and an extensive wine cellar, as well as interesting asides such as a basketball court and a private cinema.

'As a display of wealth and power, I don't think Rising Sun can be easily matched,' wrote technology reporter Karlin Lillington, who was invited onboard for a news conference in the Mediterranean, a conference where reporters were both camera-less (to protect Ellison's privacy) and barefoot (to protect the yacht).

However, it wasn't long until Ellison's world's-largest-yacht status was not only matched, but surpassed. And this time the victor was not a CEO or a celebrity, but a prince: Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, in fact, the Crown Prince of Dubai.

At 525ft, his megayacht Platinum is undisputedly the world's largest luxury yacht and, at an estimated $300 million, the most expensive. But the question is for how long?

"The bragging power with this cannot be underestimated," says Don Wallace, editor of Yachting magazine, when asked why people buy yachts that have yearly operational costs estimated at ten per cent of the yacht's value. For the Crown Prince that's a whopping $30 million dollars a year just to keep things afloat.

"It's privacy and the level of service," Wallace said. "Anyone can stay in a five-star hotel. But this is the highest level of exclusivity." And, as long as the rivalry between the world's wealthiest continues, it seems the bar of what constitutes exclusive seems set to continually rise.