Bernard Tapie, the former majority owner of Adidas, has passed away at the age of 78 after a years-long battle with cancer.
In 1990, Tapie, a French industrialist, purchased Adidas after finding success turning around a number of struggling businesses. He was credited with saving the company from bankruptcy by among other steps, shifting manufacturing to Asia; recruiting Bob Strasser, the former chief of design at Nike; and changing the image of the brand that led to the popularity of the three stripes triangle.
Adidas was able to go public by 1995 at a valuation more than six times the price Tapie paid to acquire it. Tapie eventually relinquished control over the company in 2000 due to debt challenges and a move into politics. In the 1990s, he briefly became urban affairs minister and was later elected as a leftist French and European parliament MP in Marseille.
He later told a biographer he regretted the sale, “I’ve made many mistakes in my life, but that was the biggest one. Selling one of the best known sports brands in the world for a short-lived stint as minister.”
One of France’s best-known personalities, Tapie was also a past owner of the Olympique de Marseille football club, which won the French championship while he was their owner. He bought a cycling team that twice won the Tour de France. He also owned a number of newspapers.
However, he was involved in a number of scandals, including a long legal battle over the price he received from the sale of Adidas that has yet to be fully resolved. He sued the then state-owned Crédit Lyonnais bank, his former lender, alleging the bank had sold Adidas at a depressed price. He was also convicted in 1995 on match-fixing charges, and served six months in prison after losing his appeals.
Tapie is survived by four children and his wife of 34 years, Dominique Tapie.
“Dominique Tapie and his family have the immense sadness to announce the death of her husband and their father, Bernard Tapie, this Sunday,” his family said in a statement to La Provence newspaper, in which Tapie held a majority stake. “He left peacefully, surrounded by his wife, his children and grandchildren, who were at his bedside,” the statement continued, adding that Tapie wished to be buried in Marseille, “the city of his heart”.
