The billionaire sailing champion
Swiss billionaire Ernesto Bertarelli has successfully defended the America's Cup that he prised away from New Zealand four years ago.
But for all his sporting and business achievements, the head of the Alinghi syndicate is a quiet man driven by two passions: his family and sailing.
The former owner of biotechnology firm Serono is among the 100 richest people in the world. But it was his success in sailing’s biggest competition that made Bertarelli a household name.
He has remained a rather reserved character who rarely speaks out in public. He prefers the company of his wife Kirsty and their three children to going out on the town.
His love of sailing is the other place where he finds fulfilment. He says cruising at 25 to 30 knots is the best way of putting his worries behind him.
The quiet man changed course when he decided to win the America’s Cup. Yet even on board Alinghi, under the gaze of millions of television viewers, Bertarelli tries to keep out of the limelight, preferring to leave it to the rest of the crew to appear before the cameras.
The Bertarelli family started its upward climb in Rome. At the end of the Second World War, Ernesto’s grandfather was running the pharmaceutical institute created in 1897 by Cesare Serono.
Hormone success
It was around that time that the company’s researchers discovered a natural hormone, urinary gonadotropin, which could be used to synthesise a treatment against female infertility.
To make sure it had enough good quality raw material to work with, Serono collected millions of litres of urine from nuns living in Italian convents – with the blessing of the Vatican.
With the help of the chaste sisters, the company was able to distribute one of the very first fertility treatments.
In 1954 the Vatican bank ensured that the Holy See was Serono’s main shareholder. Fourteen years later, Ernesto’s father Fabio took over the company, before becoming its biggest shareholder in the early 1970s.
Around the same time, the firm began its first activities in Switzerland. In 1977, the Bertarelli family moved to Geneva along with Serono’s headquarters.
The decision to leave Italy was because Bertarelli senior was concerned that leftwing Red Brigades militants might kidnap or harm his family. In the first ten years of the group’s existence, which was founded in 1970, it was credited with 14,000 acts of violence.
Lake Geneva shores
It was therefore on the shores of Lake Geneva that Ernesto discovered his passion for sailing.
In 1996 he was forced by his father’s failing health to take over the reins of the company at age 31. He chose to concentrate on biotechnology, and soon afterwards turnover and staff trebled.
He also benefited from the stock market boom in new technologies. By 2001 he had become Switzerland’s richest man, outstripping the owners of pharmaceutical giants Novartis and Roche.
More recently Serono has suffered from fierce competition. The patent of its biggest selling product, Rebif – half the company’s turnover – was about to run out and there was no successor for it.
For Bertarelli, this was the time to get out. Last September, he sold the company to German pharmaceutical group Merck for SFr16 billion ($13.1 billion) – too much according to many observers.
“Ernesto Bertarelli will not spend all his time at the Geneva headquarters worrying about how slow his researchers are being at coming up with a new product,” wrote the German newspaper, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. “He will be able to use his spare time to go sailing and prepare the next America’s Cup.”
That’s just where he can be found now, defending sailing’s oldest trophy. And making the land-locked Swiss dream of the sea.
swissinfo, based on an Italian article by Armando Mombelli
Ernesto Bertarelli was born in Rome in 1965. He is married and has three children.
He came to Switzerland at the age of eight – with his brother and his two sisters – and attended private schools in Geneva.
His father Fabio Bertarelli moved the headquarters of the company Serono to Geneva in 1977.
Ernesto – who had taken on Swiss nationality in the meantime – graduated from Harvard Business School in Boston in 1993.
After his father fell ill, Ernesto took over the business at Serono in 1996. His father died two years later.
In 2001 Bertarelli launched his campaign to win the America’s Cup. His Alinghi team, which is registered with the Geneva Nautical Society, clinched the trophy from defenders Team New Zealand in 2003 in Auckland.
The Bertarelli family sold Serono to the German group Merck for more than SFr16 billion ($13.2 billion) in September 2006.
During June/July 2007 the Alinghi crew, including Bertarelli, have been competing in the final of the 32nd America’s Cup against Team New Zealand off the coast of Valencia, Spain.
The name Alinghi was allegedly created by Ernesto Bertarelli and one of his sisters when they were children.
The inaugural race was held off the Isle of Wight in 1851. America dominated the race right up until 1983 when Australia won the trophy.
In 1995 New Zealand became only the third country to win the competition, successfully defending their title in 2000.
The Swiss syndicate Alinghi sailed to victory against Black Magic in 2003 and became the first European team to win the Auld Mug.
The 2007 America’s Cup off the coast of Spain started on June 23 and runs until July 5 at the latest.
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