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Mike Lynch, one of the UK’s best-known tech entrepreneurs, is among those missing after a luxury yacht sank off the coast of Sicily, according to people familiar with the matter.
Lynch’s wife, Angela Bacares, had been rescued, one of the people said. Several people are missing after the 56m yacht, Bayesian, sank in bad weather.
Camper and Nicholsons, managers of Bayesian, said the yacht “encountered severe weather and subsequently sank” near Palermo in the early hours of Monday morning.
There were 12 guests and 10 crew on board, of whom 15 have been rescued by the Italian coast guard. According to the local fire department, one body has been recovered, while six people remain missing.
Lynch, the former chief executive of Autonomy, was acquitted of criminal charges by a jury in San Francisco in June, vindicating the 59-year-old entrepreneur after a 12-year legal battle over the software group’s $11bn sale to Hewlett-Packard in 2011.
Following the verdict, Lynch said he was “elated” and was “looking forward to returning to the UK and getting back to what I love most: my family and innovating in my field”.
A spokesperson for Lynch declined to comment.
The Italian coastguard said on Monday that Bayesian sank to a depth of approximately 50 metres.
The 15 people rescued were of British, American and Canadian nationalities. Eight were transferred to local hospitals.
One of the survivors was reported to be Charlotte Golunksi, a partner at Lynch’s venture firm Invoke Capital, along with her husband James Emsilie and one-year-old daughter. She told Italian media that her family left their cabin during the storm and headed for the deck.
Records suggest that Lynch’s family owned the yacht. Bayesian is owned by Isle of Man-registered company Revtom Limited, according to shipping database Equasis. Isle of Man filings show that Bacares is the sole shareholder of Revtom.
The name Bayesian is likely to be a reference to the 18th-century English statistician Thomas Bayes, whose theory of statistics informed the search technology behind Autonomy’s software.
The Sunday Times rich list estimated Lynch’s family fortune at £500mn earlier this year.
Luca Cari, a spokesperson for the Italian fire department, said divers and other rescue workers had been working at the scene since Monday morning.
“We arrived when the ship had already sunk,” he said, adding that the operation was complicated by the depth to which the boat had sunk. Cari said the body was recovered outside the shipwreck. He declined to identify the victim.
The UK Foreign Office said: “We are providing consular support to a number of British nationals and their families following an incident in Sicily, and are in contact with the local authorities.”
Additional reporting by Jim Pickard
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