With the next America’s Cup in limbo, beset by a legal dispute between Team Alinghi, the defending team, and BMW Oracle, one of the challengers, Team Origin, of Britain, were involved in urgent talks with five counterparts last night as they seek to navigate increasingly murky and choppy waters, with thousands of jobs in the global sailing industry in jeopardy.

Origin, begun and led by Sir Keith Mills, have looked increasingly powerful on paper, with Mike Sanderson, the 2006 World Sailor of the Year, as team director and Ben Ainslie, the double Olympic champion, as helmsman among a team of 90 on the

payroll. The problem is, nobody is any clearer as to when the 33rd America’s Cup will take place; the original date of 2009 looks dead in the water, but with court-case judgments pending and appeals likely, the future of the challengers is at stake.

Grant Dalton, the Emirates Team New Zealand managing director, has allegedly told his team that if the dispute is not resolved by the end of the year and the final race is not held in 2009, his team will close. Things are not quite so apocalyptic at Origin, but operations seem likely to be scaled back or mothballed, and if there are no guarantees that the cup will take place in 2010, the team may break up.

“It is not about when it is, it is more about knowing for certain what the date will be,” Marcus Hutchinson, the Origin head of communications, said. “We’re a few weeks away from a decision like that [about the team's future]. If we knew it was going to be in 2010 then we can change the plan, but if nobody is sure and it might be 2011 or 2012 . . . the uncertainty is a big problem.”

Mills’s decision to launch the team last Christmas was a big boost for British sailing, especially because he was planning two further campaigns. “The idea is to be in the top four in an America’s Cup in 2009, win it in 2011, host the best Olympic Games in history in 2012 and defend the America’s Cup in 2013, then die a happy man,” Mills said in July while watching Alinghi successfully defend the cup.

The plans now look expensively out of kilter. A serious America’s Cup campaign costs about £15 million a year. This cup promised to be cheaper by outlawing two-boat testing, but Origin have significant start-up costs. Charles Dunstone, the owner of Carphone Warehouse, has thrown his weight behind Origin, but deep though his and Mills’s pockets are, they are only spectators at the battle of the billionaires.

Larry Ellison, the software mogul and owner of BMW Oracle, has taken Ernesto Bertarelli, the biotech billionaire and owner of Alinghi, to court and for them ego long since took over from financial sense.

Any chance of an out-of-court settlement appeared to end on Friday, when Alinghi rejected a joint proposal from three challengers to modify the demands of Oracle enough to mollify Alinghi. Oracle’s contention is that

Alinghi’s choice of Desafío Español, the Spanish syndicate, as official challengers, which allowed them to negotiate the disputed format of the next competition, is illegal.

The seven challengers — Desafío, Team New Zealand, Origin, Team Shosholoza of South Africa, United Internet Team Germany, the anonymous sixth challenger, who The Times can reveal is Mascalzone Latino, of Italy, and Ayre, the second Spanish team — are now hoping for a judgment from Justice Herman Cahn of the New York state court (which has jurisdiction over the America’s Cup) tomorrow night. Justice Cahn heard the case on October 22 and with Thanksgiving tomorrow, he may want to clear his schedule.

“It is looking like the only person who can break this logjam is Justice Cahn,” Hutchinson said.

Mike Golding and Bruno Dubois, on Ecover 3, faced a frustrating finish to the Transat Jacques Vabre last night. Michel Desjoyeaux and Emmanuel Le Borgne, on Foncia, were the first to cross the finish line off Salvador de Bahia, Brazil, yesterday, 17 days, 2 hours, 37 minutes and five seconds after leaving Le Havre. They were harried to the line by Marc Guillemot and Charles Caudrelier, on Safran, who were 54min 50sec behind. Ecover 3, which had led for four days, was expected to finish fifth last night.