Robert Louis-Dreyfus ( – ) was a French businessman who was chief executive officer (CEO) of

Adidas Adidas AG (; stylized as adidas since 1949) is a German multinational corporation, founded and headquartered in Herzogenaurach, Bavaria, that designs and manufactures shoes, clothing and accessories. It is the largest sportswear manufacture ...

(then, "Adidas Salomon") and

Saatchi & Saatchi Saatchi & Saatchi is a British multinational communications and advertising agency network with 114 offices in 76 countries and over 6,500 staff. It was founded in 1970 and is currently headquartered in London. The parent company of the agency gr ...

. He was a majority shareholder of the French

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly ...

team

Olympique de Marseille Olympique de Marseille (, ; oc, Olimpic de Marselha, ), also known simply as Marseille or by the abbreviation OM (, ), is a French professional men's football club based in Marseille, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur. Founded in 1899, the club p ...

, and during his tenure they re-emerged as a major European football club.

Early life

Robert Louis-Dreyfus was born in Paris, the son of Jean and Jeanne Madeline (née Depierre) Louis-Dreyfus.Bourdon, Jean-Claude and Jacques-Olivier Martin ''Robert Louis-Dreyfus: Les aventures d'un Don Juan des affaires'' (2007), 293 pages, His father was

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

and his mother

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: * Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD * Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a let ...

.Paris Match: "“Robert Louis-Dreyfus, un seigneur qui voyait loin et visait haut" by Jacques Veyrat
July 8, 2009 (''in French'') , ''"...cet agnostique, fils d’un juif et d’une catholique..." / "...this agnostic, the son of a Jew and a Catholic..."'' He was a great-grandson of

Léopold Louis-Dreyfus Léopold Louis-Dreyfus (5 March 1833 – 9 April 1915) was a French businessman, diplomat, and investor who was best known as the founder of the Louis Dreyfus Group, and patriarch of the Louis-Dreyfus family. The French government awarded him t ...

, founder of the

Louis-Dreyfus Group Louis Dreyfus Company B.V. (LDC), also called the Louis-Dreyfus Group, is a French merchant firm that is involved in agriculture, food processing, international shipping, and finance. The company owns and manages hedge funds, ocean vessels, deve ...

, which had begun buying and selling wheat in the

Alsace Alsace (, ; ; Low Alemannic German/ gsw-FR, Elsàss ; german: Elsass ; la, Alsatia) is a cultural region and a territorial collectivity in eastern France, on the west bank of the upper Rhine next to Germany and Switzerland. In 2020, it had ...

region a century earlier, and rapidly diversified into shipping, oil and other commodities. His grandfather was

Louis Louis-Dreyfus Louis Louis-Dreyfus (September 6, 1867 – November 10, 1940) was a member of the French parliament and co-director of the commodity distribution and trading company, Louis Dreyfus Group. Biography Louis-Dreyfus was born in Zurich to a Jewish fam ...

, who served in the

French Parliament The French Parliament (french: Parlement français) is the bicameral legislature of the French Republic, consisting of the Senate () and the National Assembly (). Each assembly conducts legislative sessions at separate locations in Paris ...

during the

French Third Republic The French Third Republic (french: Troisième République, sometimes written as ) was the system of government adopted in France from 4 September 1870, when the Second French Empire collapsed during the Franco-Prussian War, until 10 July 1940 ...

. He has two sisters: Marie-Jeanne and Monique. Robert Louis-Dreyfus was initially a bad student who failed his

Baccalauréat The ''baccalauréat'' (; ), often known in France colloquially as the ''bac'', is a French national academic qualification that students can obtain at the completion of their secondary education (at the end of the ''lycée'') by meeting certain ...

, but he excelled at poker, winning considerable amounts of money from his friends at the

Lycée Janson de Sailly In France, secondary education is in two stages: * ''Collèges'' () cater for the first four years of secondary education from the ages of 11 to 15. * ''Lycées'' () provide a three-year course of further secondary education for children between ...

in Paris. In 1967, he spent time at a

kibbutz A kibbutz ( he, קִבּוּץ / , lit. "gathering, clustering"; plural: kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1909, was Degania. Today, farming h ...

and was involved in the

Six-Day War The Six-Day War (, ; ar, النكسة, , or ) or June War, also known as the 1967 Arab–Israeli War or Third Arab–Israeli War, was fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab states (primarily Egypt, Syria, and Jordan) from 5 to 10 ...

. He later secured a place at

Harvard Business School Harvard Business School (HBS) is the graduate business school of Harvard University, a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. It is consistently ranked among the top business schools in the world and offers a large full-time MBA ...

with a presentation about his experiences during the war. He spent the early years of his working life mentored by

Siegmund Warburg Sir Siegmund George Warburg (30 September 1902 – 18 October 1982) was a German-born English banker. He was a member of the prominent Warburg family. He played a prominent role in the development of merchant banking.IMS Ims is a Norwegian surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Gry Tofte Ims (born 1986), Norwegian footballer * Rolf Anker Ims (born 1958), Norwegian ecologist See also * IMS (disambiguation) Ims is a Norwegian surname. Notable people wit ...

, the US pharmaceutical research company enjoying spectacular monetary success. His original grew twentyfold by the time the company was sold in 1988. He served as CEO at

, the United Kingdom-based

advertising agency An advertising agency, often referred to as a creative agency or an ad agency, is a business dedicated to creating, planning, and handling advertising and sometimes other forms of promotion and marketing for its clients. An ad agency is generally ...

from 1989 to 1993. Louis-Dreyfus invested his own money in Saatchi and Saatchi and during his tenure the agency grew considerably. He proved equally successful when in 1994 he took the top job at

, the German-based sporting goods maker. Louis-Dreyfus added to the brand by streamlining the product line and adding new companies to the group, including the Salomon ski-wear and golf company in 1997. He remained CEO of Adidas until 2001, combining this position with chairmanship of

Neuf Telecom Neuf Cegetel was a French wireline telecommunications service provider and a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO). It offered various telecommunications services to consumers, enterprises and wholesale customers, ranking second in the country ...

with whom he served until 2004. He also served as a director of

Neuf Cegetel Neuf Cegetel was a French wireline telecommunications service provider and a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO). It offered various telecommunications services to consumers, enterprises and wholesale customers, ranking second in the country ...

. Robert Louis-Dreyfus re-joined the family company,

, in May 2000, and restructured this major commodities trading and merchandising firm. In 2005, he decided to relaunch the Le Coq Sportif sports company through a Swiss investment company, Airesis.

Sporting interests

In 1996 Louis-Dreyfus became the largest shareholder of

, a French

team who had recently been rocked by a major match fixing scandal and subsequently relegated to the French second division as part of their punishment. Louis-Dreyfus, with Adidas and the telecommunications company Neuf, sponsored the team; Louis-Dreyfus invested heavily in rebuilding the Marseille squad, marketing the team to the new immigrant populations in Marseille. The financial fortunes of the club improved, with shirt sales rocketing. However, success, if judged purely on trophies won, still eluded the club despite reaching the final of the

UEFA Cup A cup is an open-top used to hold hot or cold liquids for pouring or drinking; while mainly used for drinking, it also can be used to store solids for pouring (e.g., sugar, flour, grains, salt). Cups may be made of glass, metal, china, clay ...

on two occasions and twice losing in the final of the

Coupe de France The Coupe de France, formerly known as the Coupe Charles Simon, is the premier knockout cup competition in French football organized by the French Football Federation (FFF). It was first held in 1917 and is open to all amateur and profession ...

. Olympique de Marseille also missed out on the

Ligue 1 Ligue 1, officially known as Ligue 1 Uber Eats for sponsorship reasons, is a French professional league for men's association football clubs. At the top of the French football league system, it is the country's primary football competition. ...

title during Louis-Dreyfus's tenure, though shortly before his death they finished second to

FC Girondins de Bordeaux Football Club des Girondins de Bordeaux (), commonly referred to as Girondins de Bordeaux ( oc, Girondins de Bordèu) or simply Bordeaux, is a French professional Association football, football club based in the city of Bordeaux in Gironde (de ...

and qualified for the group stage of the

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (abbreviated as UCL, or sometimes, UEFA CL) is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competi ...

. Louis-Dreyfus was also a shareholder in the Belgium football club

Standard Liège Royal Standard de Liège, commonly referred to as Standard Liège (; nl, Standard Luik ; german: Standard Lüttich ) or simply Standard in Belgium, is a Belgian professional football club based in the city of Liège. They are one of the most ...

, and was involved in the creation of Infront Sports & Media in 2002 (transition from the former KirchSport completed in February 2003) acting as the company's chairman of the board. The Swiss-based sports marketing agency was handling the media rights distribution of the

FIFA World Cup The FIFA World Cup, often simply called the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior men's national teams of the members of the ' ( FIFA), the sport's global governing body. The tournament has ...

2002 File:2002 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 2002 Winter Olympics are held in Salt Lake City; Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and her daughter Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon die; East Timor gains East Timor independence, indepe ...

and

2006 File:2006 Events Collage V1.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2006 Winter Olympics open in Turin; Twitter is founded and launched by Jack Dorsey; The Nintendo Wii is released; Montenegro votes to declare independence from Serbia; The 2006 ...

. Today it is the marketing partner of 130 sports federations and clubs.

FIFA World Cup bribery scandal

In October 2015 the German news magazine ''

Der Spiegel ''Der Spiegel'' (, lit. ''"The Mirror"'') is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. With a weekly circulation of 695,100 copies, it was the largest such publication in Europe in 2011. It was founded in 1947 by John Seymour Chaloner ...

'' reported that the bidding committee for the

FIFA World Cup 2006 The 2006 FIFA World Cup, also branded as Germany 2006, was the 18th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international football world championship tournament. It was held from 9 June to 9 July 2006 in Germany, which had won the right to host the ...

had set up a

slush fund A slush fund is a fund or account that is not properly accounted, such as money used for corrupt or illegal purposes, especially in the political sphere. Such funds may be kept hidden and maintained separately from money that is used for legitim ...

that Louis-Dreyfus, at the time CEO of Adidas, filled with 10.3 million Swiss francs in 2000. Allegedly these funds were used to bribe numerous FIFA officials and secure Germany's bid to host the 2006 World Cup, whilst a FIFA report had strongly criticised England's supposedly 'unprofessional' rival bid presentation. According to internal FIFA documents, Louis-Dreyfus had demanded a repayment of the funds in 2004, which were transferred as €6.7 million via a FIFA account in Geneva to an account held by Louis-Dreyfus.

Death

Louis-Dreyfus died in

Zürich , neighboring_municipalities = Adliswil, Dübendorf, Fällanden, Kilchberg, Maur, Oberengstringen, Opfikon, Regensdorf, Rümlang, Schlieren, Stallikon, Uitikon, Urdorf, Wallisellen, Zollikon , twintowns = Kunming, San Francisco Z ...

aged 63 on 4 July 2009, following a long period with

leukemia Leukemia ( also spelled leukaemia and pronounced ) is a group of blood cancers that usually begin in the bone marrow and result in high numbers of abnormal blood cells. These blood cells are not fully developed and are called ''blasts'' or ...

Personal life

Louis-Dreyfus was married twice. Before divorcing his first wife, Sarah Oberholzer, in 1989, he met his second wife Margarita Bogdanova in 1988, whom he married in 1992 and with whom he had three sons: Eric, Maurice, and Kyril Louis-Dreyfus, the latter of whom became the chairman and minority shareholder of English football club Sunderland A.F.C. in February 2021, aged only 24. Louis-Dreyfus identified as an

agnostic Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, of the divine or the supernatural is unknown or unknowable. (page 56 in 1967 edition) Another definition provided is the view that "human reason is incapable of providing sufficien ...

. The American actress

Julia Louis-Dreyfus Julia Scarlett Elizabeth Louis-Dreyfus ( ; born January 13, 1961) is an American actress, comedian, and producer who worked on the comedy television series ''Saturday Night Live'' (1982–1985), ''Seinfeld'' (1989–1998), ''The New Adventures ...

, famed for her role in the television comedy series ''

Seinfeld ''Seinfeld'' ( ) is an American television sitcom created by Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld. It aired on NBC from July 5, 1989, to May 14, 1998, over nine seasons and 180 episodes. It stars Seinfeld as a fictionalized version of himself and ...

'', is his second cousin once removed. Following his death, his enterprises were inherited and supervised by Margarita Louis-Dreyfus,

Margarita Louis-Dreyfus Margarita Louis-Dreyfus (née Bogdanova; born 1 July 1962) is a Russian-born Swiss billionaire businesswoman, chairperson of the Louis-Dreyfus Group. Early life Born Margarita Olegovna Bogdanova (russian: Маргарита Олеговна Б� ...

, fr.wikipedia she is considered to be the richest Russian woman today. Margarita inherited 60% of the organization (increased to 65% in 2012). Robert's two sisters, Monique Louis-Dreyfus Roosmale Nepveu and Marie-Jeanne Louis-Dreyfus Meyer, each own 12% and are now both billionaires.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Louis-Dreyfus, Robert 1946 births 2009 deaths Sportspeople from Paris Deaths from cancer in Switzerland Deaths from leukemia French billionaires Harvard Business School alumni Olympique de Marseille chairmen Swiss people of Jewish descent Swiss billionaires 20th-century Swiss businesspeople Swiss chief executives French chief executives Robert Louis-Dreyfus People named in the Panama Papers Adidas people Le Coq Sportif