ZOn his 70th birthday on October 18, he would have liked to have given himself a special gift: the British football club Manchester United. Jim Ratcliffe, who has risen to become a multi-billionaire in the chemical industry, enthuses that he is “a lifelong fan”. He would have loved to have bought Man United, he admits. But his plan encounters resistance from the American Glazer family. He spoke to the owners who bought the traditional club years ago. But these are not yet ready to sell, even if the former pearl of the British Premier League is currently showing massive weaknesses. Since then, the bad news has been making waves in the mother country of football.
The founder of the British chemical company Ineos seems to be able to cope well with the fact that his childhood dream has not been fulfilled for the time being. Because Ratcliffe seems energetic and aggressive in conversation as ever.
But as a crisis manager, the experienced entrepreneur, who was once the second richest man in Great Britain but is now 27th on the Sunday Times list of the rich with a fortune of just £6 billion, also has to prove himself on other projects. One of them is called “Grenadier 4×4”. Ratcliffe set his mind on creating an off-road vehicle that would be reminiscent of Land Rover’s legendary Defender model.
But his ambitious plan is difficult to get off the ground. Ineos Automotive made big losses before the first car rolled off the assembly line. First he started building a factory in Wales, but then he took over the Mercedes-Benz Smart factory in Hambach, near the German border in Lorraine. Pre-orders for the car have been available since this spring, priced at £49,000.
Ratcliffe sees his product as a combination of “rough British spirit with German engineering precision”. The car fan always seems euphoric when he talks about his off-road trips in Namibia or Iceland. But it threatens to become a costly tour de force. The costs for development and the consequences of delivery problems already add up to over 1.2 billion pounds, the Times recently calculated.
Quarrelsome Entrepreneur
Opinions differ on Ratcliffe. Among British fans of Europe, he has caused controversy with his outspoken support for Brexit and his subsequent move to the tax haven of Monaco. Others are bothered by the gruff entrepreneur, who has fought fierce conflicts with the unions for years. If his famous project “Grenadier” actually failed, the British media would be overjoyed. However, Ratcliffe himself is firmly convinced of the success of his project.
The hitherto successful self-made billionaire has worked hard to earn his reputation. Born on the outskirts of Manchester to an accountant mother and carpenter father who later ran a small furniture factory, he single-mindedly honed his career. He studied chemical engineering at the University of Birmingham, worked for the oil company Esso and Courtaulds, a chemical company. In 1989, a headhunter lured him to American private equity firm Advent International. There he made his first fortune in the 1990s.
