Lynch family ‘devastated’ and being ‘comforted by friends’ after deadly superyacht sinking
The Lynch family have said they are “devastated” and “in shock” but are being “comforted and supported by family and friends” after the Bayesian superyacht tragedy.
British tech tycoon Mike Lynch, 59, was confirmed dead by local authorities on Thursday after the yacht he was holidaying on sunk in the early hours of Monday.
Family release statement; superyacht sinking latest
Divers recovered the final missing body from the wreckage on Friday, which is believed to be that of his 18-year-old daughter Hannah. Her mother and Mr Lynch’s wife Angela Bacares survived the disaster.
A spokesperson for the family said in a statement on Friday: “The Lynch family is devastated, in shock and is being comforted and supported by family and friends.
“Their thoughts are with everyone affected by the tragedy. They would like to sincerely thank the Italian coastguard, emergency services and all those who helped in the rescue. Their one request now is that their privacy be respected at this time of unspeakable grief.”
Tributes have since poured in for both members of the family.
‘Lost one of our brightest stars’
Miss Lynch “lit up the classroom with her energy, passion for learning and sheer intelligence”, Jon Mitropoulos-Monk, head of English at Latymer Upper School in west London, said.
“I’ve never taught someone who combined sky-high intellectual ability with warmth and enthusiasm in the way Hannah did,” he said on Friday.
He added that when she was awarded her place to study at Oxford she sought out every member of staff to “thank them individually and give them a hug”.
Family friend Patrick Jacob said he has “never met anybody like Hannah”, describing her as “charming and ferociously intelligent with an insatiable thirst for life and knowledge”.
“We have lost one of our brightest stars whose future held so much promise. Her loss is unbearable,” he added.
Miss Lynch’s school friend Katya Lacie said she had a “beautiful soul”. “Being with Hannah made me feel whole and happy. She is the most special friend anyone could ask for and I will always love Hannah,” she said.
Andrew Kanter, a close friend and former colleague of her father, described Mr Lynch as “the most brilliant mind and caring person I have ever known”.
“There is simply no other UK technology entrepreneur of our generation who has had such an impact on so many people,” he said.
Hannah Lynch
Sushovan Hussain, a school friend and former colleague of Mr Lynch, also knew Morgan Stanley chairman Jonathan Bloom, his wife Judy, and Mr Lynch’s lawyer Chris Morvillo, who also died when the yacht sunk.
He said Mr Lynch’s death “leaves an unfillable hole in my life”, adding it is “tragic beyond words”.
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Mike Lynch’s neighbour: ‘Words fail me’
‘Fantastic neighbour’
Ruth Leigh lived next door to the couple in Suffolk for 15 years.
On Thursday, she described them as “fantastic neighbours” and said the tech tycoon “never played on his position” and was “very friendly and down-to-earth” despite his fortune.
“Even though they were wealthy and influential people there was never any airs and graces,” Ms Leigh told Sky News.
“He always went to the trouble of remembering your name, of asking after your partner or your children. From the very start they were fantastic neighbours – very friendly and down-to-earth.
“He’d come from a very ordinary background and through his own brains and intellect, he’d made a really great company and come up with some incredible ground-breaking tech. He was always very moral. He gave to charity very generously and never played on his position.”
She described his death so soon after the end of his legal troubles as “the saddest thing I’ve ever heard”.
“The whole point about this trip to Italy was taking his friends and family to say thank you. That’s what makes it even more tragic,” she added.
“Losing somebody so kind, compassionate, and full of integrity must leave a hole that cannot be filled.”
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Who is Mike Lynch?
Read more
Who were the people on the yacht?
What we know about the sinking so far
Doctor reveals how British mother and baby survived
Mr Lynch was extradited to the US and spent a year under house arrest in San Francisco before he was cleared of 15 charges of fraud earlier this summer by a jury.
Prosecutors claimed he deliberately overstated the value of Autonomy, the company he founded in 1996, when he sold it to Hewlett Packard in 2011. He always denied wrongdoing.
‘Brain the size of a planet’
His former colleague told Sky News on Thursday he had a “brain the size of a planet” and was a “lovely man”.
David Tabizel co-founded Autonomy with Mr Lynch and the pair remained good friends. He described him as a “remarkable individual” and the “brightest man I’ve met in my life”.
“He had a remarkable set of personality traits that we rarely see in Britain,” he said.
“Before him there was no British tech scene. He showed us we can be world-class.”
Mr Tabizel told of Mr Lynch’s “inner child”, that he “loved video games”, had a life-size train set in his garden, and how they animated a cartoon dog for their office, for which they both recorded the “barking noises”.
Commenting on his legal struggles, Mr Tabizel said he “never heard him lie or exaggerate” and he was “interested in the truth… in cutting through the noise”.
“For him to be accused of manipulating his profits. It was an extraordinary thing. It just wasn’t Mike. I loved that man and he should be celebrated as a hero.”
David Yelland, Mr Lynch’s former PR adviser and former editor of The Sun newspaper, paid tribute to him in a post on X.
He said: “All those that knew and loved Mike are thinking of Angela and their surviving daughter Esme as they struggle to come to terms with such unimaginable loss.
“We have lost a man who was failed in life by his country and his peers when he needed them most – as he looked for help in the unjust US demand that he be extradited – and he has then suffered the most unfair and brutal of fates.”
Mr Yelland said he had spoken to Mr Lynch just before he set sail on the yacht.
He also described him as a “dreamer of dreams not just for himself but for all those that knew him, worked with him or invested with him”.
The entrepreneur had “exciting plans to contribute much more to the country he loved,” he added.
Bayesian superyacht. Pic: Danny Wheelz
Lord Browne, former chief executive of BP and now chairman of BeyondNetZero, said Mr Lynch was “the person who catalysed a breed of deep tech entrepreneurs in the UK”.
“His ideas and his personal vision were a powerful contribution to science and technology in both Britain and globally. We have lost a human being of great ability,” he wrote.
Pictured in 2010. Pic: Shutterstock
‘Privileged to have known him’
Sky’s Ian King said he “feels very privileged to have known and spoken with Mike Lynch over many years”.
He described him as a “visionary and original thinker with a passion for building businesses”. “There are sadly too few like him in the UK,” he added.
Read more:
Ian King: Why the odds were stacked against Lynch
The Royal Academy of Engineering, where Mr Lynch was a former council member, donor, and mentor, said it is “deeply saddened to learn of the death of Mike Lynch”.
Sending condolences to his family, they added: “Mike became a fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering in 2008 and we have fond memories of the active role he played in the past as a mentor, donor, and former council member. He was also one of the inaugural members on the enterprise committee.”
A spokesperson for technology industry group TechUK said: “Mike Lynch was a hugely significant and pioneering figure in the UK technology sector.
“Our hearts go out to all of the families and friends who have been impacted by these tragic events,” they said.
Jonathan Bloomer of Morgan Stanley. Pic: Hiscox/ Linkedin
US lawyer Chris Morvillo. Pic: Clifford Chance
Mr Lynch’s Autonomy software was based on Bayesian statistical inference – where his family’s ill-fated yacht got its name.
The software’s global success earned him a reputation as the “British Bill Gates” and enabled companies to trawl through huge swathes of data more efficiently.
His Cambridge thesis is thought to be one of the most-read pieces of research in the institution’s library.
There was huge outcry from politicians and business leaders when Home Secretary Priti Patel approved a judge’s extradition order for him to be sent to the US for trial in 2023.
The last blast furnaces left operating in Britain could see their fate sealed within days, after their Chinese owners took the decision to cut off the crucial supply of ingredients keeping them running.
Jingye, the owner of British Steel in Scunthorpe, has, according to union representatives, cancelled future orders for the iron ore, coal and other raw materials needed to keep the furnaces running.
The upshot is that they may have to close next month – even sooner than the earliest date suggested for its closure.
Read more: Thousands of jobs at risk as British Steel consults unions over closure
The fate of the blast furnaces – the last two domestic sources of virgin steel, made from iron ore rather than recycled – is likely to be determined in a matter of days, with the Department for Business and Trade now actively pondering nationalisation.
The upshot is that even as Britain contends with a trade war across the Atlantic, it is now working against the clock to secure the future of steelmaking at Scunthorpe.
The talks between the government and Jingye broke down last week after the Chinese company, which bought British Steel out of receivership in 2020, rejected a £500m offer of public money to replace the existing furnaces with electric arc furnaces.
The sum is the same one it offered to Tata Steel, which has shut down the other remaining UK blast furnaces in Port Talbot and is planning to build electric furnaces – which have far lower carbon emissions.
These steel workers could soon be out of work
However, the owners argue that the amount is too little to justify extra investment at Scunthorpe, and said last week they were now consulting on the date of shutting both the blast furnaces and the attached steelworks.
Since British Steel is the main provider of steel rails to Network Rail – as well as other construction steels available from only a few sites in the world – the closure would leave the UK more reliant on imports for critical infrastructure sites.
However, since the site belongs to its Chinese owners, a decision to nationalise the site would involve radical steps government officials are wary of taking.
They also fear leaving taxpayers exposed to a potentially loss-making business for the long run.
The dilemma has been heightened by the sharp turn in geopolitical sentiment following Donald Trump’s return to the White House.
The incipient trade war and threatened cut in American support to Europe have sparked fresh calls for countries to act urgently to secure their own supplies of critical materials, especially those used for defence and infrastructure.
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Gareth Stace, head of UK Steel, the industry lobby group, said: “Talks seem to have broken down between government and British Steel.
“My advice to government is: please, Jonathan Reynolds, Business Secretary, get back round that negotiating table, thrash out a deal, and if a deal can’t be found in the next few days, then I fear for the very future of the sector, but also here for Scunthorpe steelworks.”
British Steel declined to comment.
UK
Prince Andrew’s Pitch@Palace branded ‘crude attempt to enrich himself’ as Chinese spy documents set to be released
Prince Andrew’s efforts to make money from his Pitch@Palace project have been branded as a “crude attempt to enrich himself” at the expense of “unsuspecting tech founders”, as new documents may shed more light on what he and his team have been attempting to sell.
Today is the deadline for documents to be released relating to Prince Andrew‘s former senior adviser Dominic Hampshire and his interactions with the alleged Chinese spy Yang Tengbo.
In February, an immigration tribunal heard how the intelligence services had contacted Mr Hampshire about Mr Yang back in 2022. Mr Yang helped set up Pitch@Palace China, a branch of the duke’s scheme to help young entrepreneurs.
The alleged Chinese spy, Yang Tengbo, has links with Prince Andrew
Yang Tengbo. Pic: Pitch@Palace
Judges banned Mr Yang from the UK, saying his association with a senior royal had made Prince Andrew “vulnerable” and posed a threat to national security. Mr Yang challenged that decision at the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC).
Since that hearing, media organisations have applied for certain documents relating to the case and Mr Hampshire’s support for Mr Yang to be made public. SIAC agreed to release some information of public interest. It is hoped they may include more details on deals that he was trying to do on behalf of Prince Andrew.
So what do we know about potential deals for Pitch@Palace so far?
In February, Sky News confirmed that palace officials had a meeting last summer with tech funding company StartupBootcamp to discuss a potential tie-up between them and Prince Andrew relating to his Pitch@Palace project.
The palace wasn’t involved in the fine details of a deal but wanted guarantees to make sure it wouldn’t impact the Royal Family in the future. Sky News understands from one source that the price being discussed for Pitch was around £750,000 – there are, however, reports that a deal may have stalled.
Photos we found on the Chinese Chamber of Commerce website show an event held in Asia between StartupBootcamp and Innovate Global, believed to be an offshoot of Pitch.
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Who is alleged Chinese spy, Yang Tengbo?
Documents, released in relation to the investigations into Mr Tengbo, have also shown how much the duke has always seen Pitch as a way of potentially making money. One document from 21 August 2021 clearly states “the duke needed money at the time, and saw the relationships with China through Pitch as one possible source of funding”.
But Prince Andrew’s apparent intention to use Pitch to make money has led to concerns about whether he is unfairly using the contacts and information he gained when he was a working royal.
Norman Baker, former MP and author of books on royal finances, believes it is “a crude attempt to enrich himself” and goes against what the tech entrepreneurs thought they were signing up for.
Read more:
Who is Yang Tenbo?
Virginia Giuffre says she has days to live
Emails between Andrew and Epstein revealed
He told Sky News: “The data given by these business people was given on the basis it was an official operation and not something for Prince Andrew, and so in my view, Prince Andrew had no right legally or morally to take the data which has been collected, a huge amount of data, and sell it…
“And quite clearly if you’re going to sell it off to StartupBootcamp, that is not what people had in mind. The entrepreneurs who joined Pitch@Palace did not do so to enrich Prince Andrew,” he said.
Rich Wilson was one tech entrepreneur who was approached at the start of Pitch@Palace to sign up, but he stepped away when he spotted a clause in the contract saying they’d be entitled to 2% equity in any funding he secured.
He feels Prince Andrew is continuing to use those he made a show of supporting.
He said: “It makes me feel sick. I think it’s terrible – that he is continuing to exploit unsuspecting tech founders in this way. A lot of them, I’m quite grey and old in the tooth now, I saw it coming, but clearly most didn’t. And a lot of them were quite young.
“It’ll be their first venture and you’re learning on the trot, so to speak. So to take advantage of people in such a major way – that’s an awful, sickening thing to do.”
We approached StartupBootcamp who said they had no comment to make, and the Duke of York’s office did not respond.
With reports that a deal may have stalled, it could be a big setback for the duke – especially with questions still about how he’ll continue to pay for his home on the Windsor estate now that the King no longer gives him financial support.
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