OGC Nice owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe in bid to buy Manchester United
Jim Ratcliffe © OGC Nice
The Ineos Group, controlled by billionaire Sir Jim Ratcliffe, confirmed on Tuesday that it was a candidate to buy the Manchester club.
This is another step forward in Ineos’, strategy, which has seen it expand its investments in sport since 2017, in football and cycling, as well as motor sports, athletics and sailing.
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Having already entered the fray to buy Chelsea several months ago, Sir Jim Ratcliffe and the Ineos group, who are already owners of OGC Nice, are now planning to get their hands on the iconic Manchester club, of which the British billionaire is a keen supporter.
As one of Europe’s biggest clubs, Manchester United, currently owned by the American Glazer family, would be a major step forward for Ineos in sport. In 2019, the acquisition of the former Sky cycling team (now Ineos) already made a big splash.
Marrying its image to that of such a prestigious club, with a globally recognised brand, would be a huge boost to the group’s marketing strategy.
Football, Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s main target
“The most popular sport in the world is football, and it is the sport closest to us,” Monaco resident Sir Jim Ratcliffe told a Financial Times conference last October. “so we should have an asset.”
Ambitious for OGC Nice, as he has said on several occasions, Sir Jim Ratcliffe has recently entrusted the sports management aspect to Florent Ghisolfi, who arrived from RC Lens, in addition to having appointed Jean-Claude Blanc (ex-PSG) CEO of Ineos Sports.
With a busy mercato in store in terms of arrivals (Terem Moffi?) and departures (Mario Lemnia and Lucas Da Cunha have already left the club, Alexis Claude-Maurice has been loaned out), OGC Nice has begun a new phase in its restructuring plan.
A further sign that the Ineos group intends to invest in the Riviera club, even though it is also looking to acquire Manchester United.