Brabus Builds Its First Superyacht Range With AB Yachts

What exactly did Brabus premiere at Monaco?

The BRABUS AB110, a 33.7-metre carbon composite yacht built with AB Yachts, reached 48 knots in its unveiling and is the tuning house's first full-sized yacht, flanked by two sibling models spanning 95 to 150 feet.

Brabus, based in Bottrop, Germany and founded in 1977, has spent nearly five decades tuning Mercedes-Benz and other manufacturers' cars into limited-edition supercars rather than building boats outright. Constantin Buschmann, the company's CEO and owner, framed the launch plainly: "This year, however, we are doing something we have never done before: with the world premiere of the BRABUS AB110, we are presenting the first-ever BRABUS yacht." The partner supplying the actual yacht-building expertise is AB Yachts, an Italian builder founded in 1992 and based in Viareggio, part of Next Yacht Group, whose deputy chairman Giorgio Mattei said the partnership was "quite simply, love at first sight" from the two companies' first meeting, and that it is "about much more than bringing two brands together."

The AB110 is the centrepiece of a three-model range. The smaller BRABUS AB95, at 95 feet, was announced alongside it with no further specification given. The larger BRABUS AB150, at 150 feet, will have its own world premiere at the Monaco Yacht Show in 2027, timed to Brabus's 50th anniversary, giving the whole range a staged rollout across three consecutive Monaco shows rather than a single launch. AB Yachts itself became part of Next Yacht Group, alongside the existing Maiora brand, in 2021, and the group has since positioned AB Yachts as its performance flank: Maiora builds more conventional flybridge cruisers, while AB Yachts supplies the composite, high-speed hulls that made it a plausible partner for a car-tuning house wanting a genuinely fast boat rather than a fast-looking one.

What makes the AB110 different from a standard 110-footer?

The AB110 pairs AB Yachts' composite high-performance hull and waterjet propulsion with Brabus's carbon-and-red design language, aiming at 48 knots, well above what most yachts this size reach.

The specification sheet reads closer to a performance car than a typical 110-foot yacht: a 6.8-metre beam, a shallow 1.3-metre draught, and up to three MTU 16V 2000 M96L engines, each producing 1,939 kW (2,600 hp), for 7,800 hp combined, driving a waterjet propulsion system rather than conventional shafts and propellers. Waterjets trade some low-speed efficiency for a shallower draught and better protection in skinny water, which fits a yacht built to hop between islands rather than cross oceans. Brabus and AB Yachts also fitted an advanced stabilisation system, needed to keep a boat capable of 48 knots comfortable both at speed and at anchor, since a hull built light and fine enough to plane that fast usually rolls more than a heavier cruiser when stopped.

The design carries Brabus's car-tuning identity onto the water: carbon-fibre exterior elements, the marque's signature red accents, and a cabin finished in what the companies call the Masterpiece interior philosophy, including a Triangle quilting pattern on the upholstery that echoes Brabus's automotive seat stitching almost exactly. An aft garage folds down into a sea-level beach club and lounge, a feature more usually seen on explorer yachts twice this size, and one that turns tender and toy stowage, normally hidden away, into part of the yacht's everyday living space when the boat is at anchor. The colour scheme itself is deliberate: Brabus has used variations of black, carbon and red across its car range for decades, and carrying it onto a hull is as much a recognition device for existing owners as a styling choice, the same logic a luxury carmaker uses when it puts a signature colour on a limited run of vehicles.

Who is the AB110 actually built for?

Accommodation for up to ten guests is modest for a 110-footer, and combined with the speed-first, carbon-everything spec sheet it points to an owner who wants a fast, badge-matched toy for short hops rather than a full-time liveaboard cruiser.

Ten guests is on the low side for the length: a conventional 110-foot motor yacht from a mainstream builder often sleeps a similar or greater number across more cabins, trading some of that space for tankage, stabiliser gear and, here, three main engines instead of the usual two. The AB110 reads as a weekend and short-passage boat built around straight-line performance rather than cabin count, closer in spirit to a very large sportsboat than to a conventional charter-oriented 110-footer.

The crossover logic mirrors a pattern seen elsewhere in yachting, where an automotive or lifestyle brand lends a design language to a specialist boatbuilder rather than trying to build hulls itself. Brabus had already tested that model at smaller scale: a tender collaboration with Finland's Axopar Boats produced the Brabus Shadow range, and a partnership with Sunreef Yachts put Brabus detailing on a production catamaran the year before this launch. The AB110 is the first time that approach has scaled up to a full, purpose-built superyacht rather than a tender or an existing production hull dressed in Brabus trim.

Is Brabus really new to boats, or has it dabbled before?

This is Brabus's first full-sized yacht under its own name, but the company was not starting cold: it had already worked with Axopar on tenders and Sunreef on catamaran detailing, and AB Yachts itself brings three decades of building composite high-speed hulls up to 60 knots.

AB Yachts, operating within Next Yacht Group since its founding in Viareggio in 1992 and folded into the group alongside Maiora in 2021, has built its reputation on composite performance hulls in the 80 to 130-foot range capable of up to 60 knots, rather than volume cruisers, which is the specific skill a 48-knot, 7,800-hp yacht needs. That track record is what lets Brabus attach its name to a finished, tested platform rather than developing a hull from zero, and it explains why the collaboration moved from a July 2026 announcement to a finished, running boat at Monaco just two months later: the hull and propulsion engineering were largely proven before Brabus's design language was applied to them. It also explains the division of labour behind the partnership: AB Yachts is not a badge customer here any more than Brabus is a passive one, since each side is supplying the part of the boat the other could not have built alone.

What is not yet available is independent verification of this specific boat: the AB110 has just had its world premiere, so there is no independent sea trial report, no price for a customer hull, and no stated delivery timeline for a first buyer. Those will only exist once an owner actually takes delivery and a marine journalist gets time aboard away from a boat show berth.