PHOTOGRAPHY: FRANCO PACE/ROYAL HUISMAN;
© 1996
SUN MICROSYSTEMS INC
OWNERS’ CLUBthe mind of an engineer. “I’m not a sailor; I don’t sail
the boat. I’m an engineer,” he admits. He and wife
Shannon wanted everyone involved with the project to
think outside the box. Every system was challenged
and optimized. At one point, Royal Huisman set up five
tents in the yard as workshops so that the scientists,
engineers and technicians the Joys brought into
the project could be working on site in immediate
proximity to each other. The yacht, launched in 2009,
was a living laboratory, with efficiency woven into
every corner and system on board.
Ethereal features the first true hybrid solution
installed on a yacht, with its 500kWh lithium-iron
phosphate battery bank (chosen for its safety) resting
under the corridor to the aft cabins. It is a system thatmost popular programming
languages. This boosted
Sun Microsystems into the
stratosphere and put Joy into
direct contact with other
entrepreneurs such as Bruce
Katz, the man behind the
famous Rockport shoe brand
of Massachusetts and owner of
the 142ft Royal Huisman
sailing yacht Juliet. Their
chance meeting during a
business conference led first to
a friendship and then directly
to Joy building his very own
190ft sailing yacht, Ethereal.
“It was sailing with Bruce
aboard his Juliet; such a great
experience. I actually met
Bruce before he built Juliet.
He had a lifelong dream of
building [his own boat to sail
around the world] and because
we both like design, we talked a lot about it. I inherited
that dream,” Joy says.
After 21 years at Sun Microsystems, Joy made a huge
career shift in 2005, becoming a venture capitalist with
the Silicon Valley firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield
& Byers (KPCB). He put his analytical ability into
identifying and investing in disruptive early-stage
“green” technologies, notably wind, solar, energy
storage and semiconductor technologies for mobile
devices. It was the late Tom Perkins, an avid sailor,
who nurtured Joy’s nascent interest in sailing while
former US vice president Al Gore, a KPCB senior
partner, influenced him to build the most efficient,
eco-friendly yacht possible.
When the time came to fulfill his sailing dream, Joy
wanted the same team that created Juliet: Ron Holland
as naval architect with the late Pieter Beeldsnijder for
the interior and Royal Huisman to build it. “I really
wanted to do a project with Pieter,” Joy says. “Bruce’s
description of working with him was just so great.”
Beeldsnijder and Joy hit it off. “It was such a pleasure
to watch him work. He was very much an old-school
person. He wouldn’t sit at a computer, he would sketch
with pencil. He could freehand perspective drawings.
He was a wizard and he could make you understand
how things were going to feel. He was such a joy to be
around. His effervescent happiness in doing the design
was infectious,” Joy recalls.
While Katz’s project was driven by emotion, Joy
approached the build of his family-focused yacht withYEARS OF JOY
Working at Berkeley
(top); with Shannon
(above left); with
Pieter Beeldsnijder
(above) and with the
Sun Microsystems
founders (below)HE AND SHANNON
WANTED EVERYONE
INVOLVED WITH
THE PROJECT
TO THINK OUTSIDE
OF THE BOX81