Rocco Benetton (born 29 September 1969) is an Italian entrepreneur publicly known for his role as

Chief Executive Officer A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

of championship-winning

Formula One Formula One (also known as Formula 1 or F1) is the highest class of international racing for open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The World Drivers' Championship, ...

Team Benetton.

Personal background

He is the son of Maria Teresa and

Luciano Benetton Luciano Benetton (born 13 May 1935) is an Italian billionaire businessman and one of the co-founders of Benetton Group, an Italian fashion brand. He served as the chairman of Benetton from 1978 to 2012. Early life Luciano Benetton was born on ...

and member of the Italian

Benetton family Four members of the Italian Benetton family () founded the Benetton Group S.p.A. fashion company in 1965.Benetton Group Benetton Group S.r.l. () is a global fashion brand based in Ponzano Veneto, Italy, founded in 1965. Benetton Group has a network of about 5,000 stores worldwide. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Benetton family's holding company Edizio ...

S.p.A. clothing company in 1965. He is married and the father of three children.

Academic studies

After attending high school in his home town of

Treviso Treviso ( , ; vec, Trevixo) is a city and ''comune'' in the Veneto region of northern Italy. It is the capital of the province of Treviso and the municipality has 84,669 inhabitants (as of September 2017). Some 3,000 live within the Veneti ...

, he moved to the United States to study

mechanical engineering Mechanical engineering is the study of physical machines that may involve force and movement. It is an engineering branch that combines engineering physics and mathematics principles with materials science, to design, analyze, manufacture, and ...

Boston University Boston University (BU) is a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. The university is nonsectarian, but has a historical affiliation with the United Methodist Church. It was founded in 1839 by Methodists with its original campu ...

in 1989.

Career in Wall Street

At the end of his studies, Benetton moved to New York City at the beginning of 1994 where he worked in Wall Street for Oppenheimer & Co. and

Alpha Investment Management Alpha (uppercase , lowercase ; grc, ἄλφα, ''álpha'', or ell, άλφα, álfa) is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of one. Alpha is derived from the Phoenician letter aleph , which ...

as a hedge fund specialist and later served as managing director.

Career in F1

In 1997, Benetton then moved to Oxford, England where he was appointed chief executive officer of

Benetton Formula One Benetton Formula Ltd., commonly referred to simply as Benetton, was a Formula One constructor that participated from to . The team was owned by the Benetton family who run a worldwide chain of clothing stores of the same name. In 2000, the te ...

, the team racing in the World Formula One Championship. Following the departure of chief executive Flavio Briatore and Michael Schumacher, he was able to lead the team for four years working very closely with "Mr. F1"

Bernie Ecclestone Bernard Charles Ecclestone (born 28 October 1930) is an English business magnate. He is the former chief executive of the Formula One Group, which manages Formula One motor racing and controls the commercial rights to the sport, and part-owns ...

into achieving good results. The team, however, was not able to keep up with the financial investment level of the newcomer car manufacturers, so Benetton directed and managed the sale of the BF1 Team to Renault Group for at the time a record agreement in 2000 including the following co-branding exposure for two more F1 seasons.

Entrepreneurial career

After his four-year English experience, Benetton later moved back to his family home town Treviso where he settled with his family and children. Surrounded by a very strong entrepreneurial environment, he founded the companies

Zero Rh+ 0 (zero) is a number representing an empty quantity. In place-value notation such as the Hindu–Arabic numeral system, 0 also serves as a placeholder numerical digit, which works by multiplying digits to the left of 0 by the radix, usuall ...

and the Oot Group, a top-of-the-line web company, with the world's largest communication company

WPP plc WPP plc is a British multinational communications, advertising, public relations, technology, and commerce holding company headquartered in London, England. It was the world's largest advertising company, as of 2019. WPP plc owns many compan ...

. In 2003, he also founded Banca del Gottardo Italia, personally acquired a 4% stake in the bank and joined the board together with Alberto Bombasei (

Brembo SpA Brembo S.p.A. is an Italian manufacturer of automotive brake systems, especially for high-performance cars and motorcycles. Its head office is in Curno, Bergamo, Italy. History Brembo was established in Paladina, Italy on January 11, 1961 ...

), Domenico Bosatelli ( Gewiss SpA) and Tito Lombardini (

Gruppo Lombardini Gruppo may refer to: * groupset A groupset or gruppo (from the Italian for "group", sometimes misspelled grouppo) is a bicycle component manufacturer's organized collection of mechanical parts. It generally refers to all of the components that ma ...

). After a very successful development of the business, Banca del Gottardo was acquired in totality by

Banca Generali Banca Generali S.p.A. is an Italian bank focused on private banking and wealth management for high-net-worth individuals. The bank is a component of FTSE MIB index, representing the blue-chip of Borsa Italiana. The majority of its shares are owne ...

in May 2008. Through his experience acquired in technology, it was clear to Benetton that the security of new technology was becoming an increasingly prevalent problem and he decided to focus in that direction. In 2013, together with a highly skilled team with international experience from Etnoteam, Value Partners, Value Team, Sun Microsystems, IBM, he founded a research company, Mobisec Group, to develop high-end security for companies in apps and

internet of things The Internet of things (IoT) describes physical objects (or groups of such objects) with sensors, processing ability, software and other technologies that connect and exchange data with other devices and systems over the Internet or other comm ...

in general. After five years of research and development, Mobisec was able to go to market to service the top companies in the Italian market. After significant growth in the domestic market, Mobisec USA opened in 2020 in Menlo Park, Palo Alto, California to enhance and develop its own product at a higher level. Today, Benetton is a very active private investor in many startup companies in Europe, Asia and in the United States.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Benetton, Rocco Formula One team owners 1969 births Living people Boston University College of Engineering alumni Benetton people

Rocco Rocco or Rocko is both a given name and a surname. Notable people with the name include: First name * Rocco Baldelli (born 1981), American Major League Baseball player and manager of the Minnesota Twins * Rocco Botte (born 1983), American actor an ...

Italian motorsport people Benetton Formula