Bruce Craig

Bruce Craig (born December 1962)[1] is a businessperson, entrepreneur and owner of Bath Rugby club.

As of 2017, Craig has a net worth of £300 million, according to The Sunday Times Rich List.[2]

Early life

Born in Bristol, Craig's father John Craig an English businessman worked for British American Tobacco.[3]

Craig studied at St Brendan's College a Grammar School where he captained the 1st XV of the school's rugby team.[4] He was chosen to represent the south of England at 18 but missed the U19 final England schools rugby trial due to a fractured leg.[4] Craig then studied Sport and Business management at Loughborough University achieving a Bachelor of Science degree.

Between 1987 and 1993, Craig played rugby for French team Racing Club de France.[5]

Career

In 1997, Marken, a logistics business, was acquired for £2.5m by Ocean Group (later to become Exel Logistics and merge into Deutsche Post). In 1999 Craig was appointed CEO of the Company, and from that point Craig led a number of successful management buyouts over a period of 10 years. The first transaction in 2003 saw 3I venture capital enter into the shareholding of Marken for a price of £210m. 3i then exited the business for £420m after 2 years making £100m profit from the transaction. In 2005, Craig led a secondary management buyout of what had become a Pharmaceutical support services Company with the backing of Intermediate Capital Group.[6] Craig and the management now owned a significant majority stake in the new business.[6] In 2009, the company was bought by Apax Partners for £975 million (the first major private equity transaction in the world after the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the financial crash of 2008. Craig continued to hold a minority stake.[6] Craig stood back from the business as non-executive Chairman to concentrate on other activities.

Bath Rugby

In 2010, Craig acquired 100% of Bath Rugby and moved the club's administrative headquarters into Farleigh House, where the new training facilities were situated.[4][5]

Craig also announced plans to build a new 18,000-capacity stadium for the club.[7]

Private life

[3] He is married with two sons and has a homes in Bath and Aix en Provence in the South of France. He has a private jet.[3]

References
  1. "Bruce Timothy CRAIG - Personal Appointments (free information from Companies House)". beta.companieshouse.gov.uk. Retrieved 2018-03-15.
  2. Times, The Sunday (2017-05-05). "The Sunday Times Rich List 2017: The richest in the Southwest". The Sunday Times. ISSN 0956-1382. Retrieved 2018-03-15.
  3. Kitson, Robert (2010-10-22). "Rugby's down-to-earth sugar daddy with a grand vision for Bath | Robert Kitson". the Guardian. Retrieved 2018-03-15.
  4. Gallagher, Brendan (2010-04-14). "Bath Rugby bought by millionaire fan Bruce Craig". ISSN 0307-1235. Retrieved 2018-03-15.
  5. "Owner Bruce Craig believes Bath can be 'best in Europe'". BBC Sport. 2011-08-02. Retrieved 2018-03-15.
  6. "Apax pays £975m in Marken buy-out". Financial Times. Retrieved 2018-03-15.
  7. Evans, Daniel (2018-01-10). "Architects have been chosen to design new Bath Rugby stadium at the Rec". bathchronicle. Retrieved 2018-03-15.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.