Dietrich Mateschitz (; 20 May 1944 – 22 October 2022) was an Austrian billionaire businessman. He was the co-founder and 49% owner of
Red Bull GmbH
Red Bull GmbH () is an Austrian private company known for its range of energy drinks of the same name. It is also known for its sponsorship of a range of sporting events and teams. The headquarters of Red Bull GmbH are located in Fuschl am S ...
. In April 2022, Mateschitz's net worth was estimated at US$27.4 billion.
Mateschitz worked in marketing for
Unilever
Unilever plc is a British multinational consumer goods company with headquarters in London, England. Unilever products include food, condiments, bottled water, baby food, soft drink, ice cream, instant coffee, cleaning agents, energy dri ...
and
Blendax
Blendax GmbH, founded in 1932 in Mainz, was a German manufacturer of personal hygiene products and toothpaste between 1936 and 2002. With an annual production of 43 million tubes of toothpaste, it was at one time Europe's largest toothpaste produc ...
. While travelling in
Thailand
Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...
, he discovered the drink
Krating Daeng, which he adapted into
Red Bull
Red Bull is a brand of energy drinks of Austrian company Red Bull GmbH. With 38% market share, it is the most popular energy drink brand as of 2019. Since its launch in 1987, more than 100 billion cans of Red Bull have been sold worldwide, inclu ...
. He founded Red Bull GmbH in 1984 and launched it in
Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
in 1987. His company acquired or founded several sports teams around the world, including five-time
Constructors' Champions Red Bull Racing
Red Bull Racing, also simply known as Red Bull or RBR and currently competing as Oracle Red Bull Racing, is a Formula One racing team, racing under an Austrian licence and based in the United Kingdom. It is one of two Formula One teams owned ...
and sister team
AlphaTauri AlphaTauri or ''variant'', may refer to:
*Aldebaran, also known as Alpha Tauri (α Tau)
*AlphaTauri (fashion brand), fashion brand
* Scuderia AlphaTauri, Formula One team since 2020; formerly Scuderia Toro Rosso
See also
*
*
*
*
* A Tauri
* ...
in
Formula One
Formula One (also known as Formula 1 or F1) is the highest class of international racing for open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The World Drivers' Championship, ...
, and
association football teams including
FC Red Bull Salzburg
FC Red Bull Salzburg is an Austrian professional football club based in Wals-Siezenheim, that competes in the Austrian Bundesliga, the top flight of Austrian Football. Their home ground is the Red Bull Arena. Due to sponsorship restrictions, ...
and
RB Leipzig
RasenBallsport Leipzig e.V. (), commonly known as RB Leipzig, and colloquially referred to as Red Bull Leipzig, is a German professional football club based in Leipzig, Saxony. The club was founded in 2009 by the initiative of the company Red Bul ...
.
Early life and education
Mateschitz was born on 20 May 1944, in
Sankt Marein im Mürztal,
Styria
Styria (german: Steiermark ; Serbo-Croatian and sl, ; hu, Stájerország) is a state (''Bundesland'') in the southeast of Austria. With an area of , Styria is the second largest state of Austria, after Lower Austria. Styria is bordered ...
,
Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
,
to a family of
Slovene or
Croatian ancestry. His mother's side was from
Styria
Styria (german: Steiermark ; Serbo-Croatian and sl, ; hu, Stájerország) is a state (''Bundesland'') in the southeast of Austria. With an area of , Styria is the second largest state of Austria, after Lower Austria. Styria is bordered ...
, his father's side was from
Maribor
Maribor ( , , , ; also known by other historical names) is the second-largest city in Slovenia and the largest city of the traditional region of Lower Styria. It is also the seat of the City Municipality of Maribor, the seat of the Drava sta ...
(now in
Slovenia
Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the southeast, and ...
);
[''The Soda With Buzz.'' Kerry A. Dolan. Forbes, p. 126, vol. 175, No. 6 (28 March 2005)] some sources place his ancestry in the area of
Zadar
Zadar ( , ; historically known as Zara (from Venetian and Italian: ); see also other names), is the oldest continuously inhabited Croatian city. It is situated on the Adriatic Sea, at the northwestern part of Ravni Kotari region. Zadar ser ...
where he allegedly had relatives and the surname ''Matešić'' was common. He declared himself a "Styrian cosmopolitan". Both his parents were school teachers.
He attended the ''Hochschule für Welthandel'' (now
Vienna University of Economics and Business
The Vienna University of Economics and Business (german: Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien, WU) is a public research university in Vienna, Austria, the largest university focusing on business, management and economics in Europe. It has been ranked ...
), where after ten years, he graduated with a marketing degree in 1972.
He was keen and passionate about extreme sports at an early age.
Career
Mateschitz's first employer was
Unilever
Unilever plc is a British multinational consumer goods company with headquarters in London, England. Unilever products include food, condiments, bottled water, baby food, soft drink, ice cream, instant coffee, cleaning agents, energy dri ...
, where he worked marketing
detergents. He subsequently moved to
Blendax
Blendax GmbH, founded in 1932 in Mainz, was a German manufacturer of personal hygiene products and toothpaste between 1936 and 2002. With an annual production of 43 million tubes of toothpaste, it was at one time Europe's largest toothpaste produc ...
, the German cosmetics company (since bought by
Procter & Gamble
The Procter & Gamble Company (P&G) is an American multinational consumer goods corporation headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, founded in 1837 by William Procter and James Gamble. It specializes in a wide range of personal health/consumer he ...
), where he worked on, among other things, the marketing of Blendax
toothpaste
Toothpaste is a paste or gel dentifrice used with a toothbrush to clean and maintain the aesthetics and health of teeth. Toothpaste is used to promote oral hygiene: it is an abrasive that aids in removing dental plaque and food from the teeth, ...
.
[''Red Bull CEO takes foot off gas.'' The Nation (Thailand). 26 November 2001.] It was as part of his travels for Blendax, on the way from Bangkok airport to the city centre, that Mateschitz bought a bottle of
Krating Daeng, the drink that would later become
Red Bull
Red Bull is a brand of energy drinks of Austrian company Red Bull GmbH. With 38% market share, it is the most popular energy drink brand as of 2019. Since its launch in 1987, more than 100 billion cans of Red Bull have been sold worldwide, inclu ...
.
"One glass
f Krating Daengand the jet lag was gone", he recalled. Sensing the commercial opportunities of this drink in Europe, Mateschitz struck a partnership deal with the Thai businessman
Chaleo Yoovidhya who had already been successfully selling Krating Daeng to lorry drivers and factory workers.
In 1984, he founded Red Bull GmbH with Yoovidhya, launching the brand in Austria in 1987.
Subsequently, he turned the Red Bull drink into a world market leader among
energy drinks. It was revealed that he worked on the formula for around three years before the modified drink was launched under the new name Red Bull in 1987.
Mateschitz also owned ''Seitenblicke'', Austria's top society magazine, but avoided the celebrity circuit and watched most Formula One races on TV despite owning two teams.
He also founded Media House in Austria in 2007 by providing various
digital entertainment and thousands of hours of images to interested broadcasters.
Mateschitz owned
ServusTV, a television channel based in
Salzburg
Salzburg (, ; literally "Salt-Castle"; bar, Soizbuag, label=Austro-Bavarian) is the fourth-largest city in Austria. In 2020, it had a population of 156,872.
The town is on the site of the Roman settlement of ''Iuvavum''. Salzburg was founded ...
. The channel was criticised for allegedly downplaying the seriousness of the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...
.
The channel is considered to have a right-wing position, and was one of only three media outlets given a
press pass
A press pass (alternatively referred to as a press card or a journalist pass) grants some type of special privilege to journalists. Some cards have recognized legal status; others merely indicate that the bearer is a practicing journalist. The na ...
to the "Defenders of Europe" conference of right-wing and far-right activists in October 2016. In May 2016, Mateschitz announced he would shut down the channel as his employees had requested to form a
works council; he changed his mind when no such council was formed.
Sports
Mateschitz's brands are consistently marketed as associated with the physical and mental attributes needed for various types of
extreme sports
Action sports, adventure sports or extreme sports are activities perceived as involving a high degree of risk. These activities often involve speed, height, a high level of physical exertion and highly specialized gear. Extreme tourism overl ...
such as
surfing
Surfing is a surface water sport in which an individual, a surfer (or two in tandem surfing), uses a board to ride on the forward section, or face, of a moving wave of water, which usually carries the surfer towards the shore. Waves suitable ...
,
skydiving, cliff diving,
winter sports
Winter sports or winter activities are competitive sports or non-competitive recreational activities which are played on snow or ice. Most are variations of skiing, ice skating and sledding. Traditionally, such games were only played in cold a ...
and
mountain biking
Mountain biking is a sport of riding bicycles off-road, often over rough terrain, usually using specially designed mountain bikes. Mountain bikes share similarities with other bikes but incorporate features designed to enhance durability and pe ...
through
commercial sponsorship. Under his tenure, Red Bull was widely acclaimed for its creative and intensive marketing of extreme sports. The successful high altitude skydiving exploration from the edge of space which was carried out by
Red Bull Stratos in collaboration with
Felix Baumgartner in October 2012 is considered as one of the turning points in Red Bull's history in terms of its intensive marketing strategies in the context of extreme sports.
Motorsport
Red Bull formerly owned more than 60 percent of the
Sauber
Sauber Motorsport AG is a Swiss motorsport engineering company. It was founded in 1970 (as PP Sauber AG) by Peter Sauber, who progressed through hillclimbing and the World Sportscar Championship to reach Formula One in . After operating it un ...
Formula One
Formula One (also known as Formula 1 or F1) is the highest class of international racing for open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The World Drivers' Championship, ...
motor racing team, and was the team's main sponsor. However, Red Bull ended its relationship with Sauber at the end of 2001 after the team opted to sign
Kimi Räikkönen
Kimi-Matias Räikkönen (; born 17 October 1979), nicknamed "The Iceman", is a Finnish racing driver who competed in Formula One between 2001 and 2021 for Sauber, McLaren, Ferrari, Lotus, and Alfa Romeo. Räikkönen won the 2007 Formula One Wor ...
as one of their drivers for the
2001 season instead of Red Bull protege
Enrique Bernoldi
Enrique Antônio Langue e Silvério de Bernoldi (born 19 October 1978) is a Brazilian professional racing driver who raced for the Arrows Formula One team in 2001 and 2002, and was the test driver for British American Racing (later Honda) betw ...
. In November 2004, Mateschitz bought the failing
Jaguar Racing
Jaguar Racing is the name given to Jaguar Land Rover's racing interests. It currently competes in Formula E under the name Jaguar TCS Racing as a result of the partnership with Tata Consultancy Services. It was previously a Formula One constr ...
Formula One team from its previous owners,
Ford, and he renamed it as a full-blown
Red Bull Racing
Red Bull Racing, also simply known as Red Bull or RBR and currently competing as Oracle Red Bull Racing, is a Formula One racing team, racing under an Austrian licence and based in the United Kingdom. It is one of two Formula One teams owned ...
team for the following season in
2005
File:2005 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico; the Funeral of Pope John Paul II is held in Vatican City; " Me at the zoo", the first video ever to be uploaded to YouTube; Eris was discover ...
. The fee was undisclosed. Red Bull recruited former Formula-2 driver
Christian Horner as team principal while also bringing one of the sport's leading design engineer
Adrian Newey on board as the technical director for a salary of $10m.
In September 2005, Mateschitz joined forces with his close friend and former Formula One driver,
Gerhard Berger, to purchase the Italian-registered
Minardi
Minardi was an Italian automobile racing team and constructor founded in Faenza in 1979 by Giancarlo Minardi. It competed in the Formula One World Championship from 1985 until 2005 with little success, nevertheless acquiring a loyal followi ...
team from its Australian owner
Paul Stoddart. This team was meant to serve as a Junior team to Red Bull Racing and was renamed as ''
Scuderia Toro Rosso'' ( it, Red Bull Stable) in 2006, and then ''AlphaTauri'' in 2020.
Sebastian Vettel
Sebastian Vettel (; born 3 July 1987) is a German racing driver who competed in Formula One from 2007 to 2022 for BMW Sauber, Toro Rosso, Red Bull, Ferrari, and Aston Martin. Vettel is one of the most successful drivers in Formula One histo ...
won the
2008 Italian Grand Prix for Toro Rosso. His victory at the
2009 Chinese Grand Prix was the first for Red Bull Racing. In 2010, Red Bull Racing won the Formula One World Constructors' Championship and Vettel won the Drivers' Championship. They then went on to win both titles for the next three years running in
2011
File:2011 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: a protester partaking in Occupy Wall Street heralds the beginning of the Occupy movement; protests against Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, who was killed that October; a young man celebrates ...
,
2012
File:2012 Events Collage V3.png, From left, clockwise: The passenger cruise ship Costa Concordia lies capsized after the Costa Concordia disaster; Damage to Casino Pier in Seaside Heights, New Jersey as a result of Hurricane Sandy; People gat ...
, and
2013
File:2013 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: Edward Snowden becomes internationally famous for leaking classified NSA wiretapping information; Typhoon Haiyan kills over 6,000 in the Philippines and Southeast Asia; The Dhaka garment fa ...
. Eight years later they won the Formula One World Drivers' Championship again with
Max Verstappen
Max Emilian Verstappen (; born 30 September 1997) is a Belgian-Dutch racing driver and the 2021 and 2022 Formula One World Champion. He competes under the Dutch flag in Formula One with Red Bull Racing.
Verstappen is the son of racing dr ...
in the
2021 season, while finishing runners-up in the Formula One World Constructors' Championship which was won by
Mercedes. In the
2022 season, Verstappen retained his title, the sixth by a Red Bull driver. Prior to Max Verstappen's heroics, Red Bull endured a rough patch and lean phase having gone winless in the Constructor's Championship for around eight years, coinciding with the arrival of F1's turbo-hybrid engines which first came into the picture in 2014 that even led to a fallout with their main engine supplier
Renault
Groupe Renault ( , , , also known as the Renault Group in English; legally Renault S.A.) is a French multinational automobile manufacturer established in 1899. The company produces a range of cars and vans, and in the past has manufactured ...
. Red Bull made a dramatic turnaround in both 2021 and 2022 seasons albeit of a reunion with
Honda
is a Japanese public multinational conglomerate manufacturer of automobiles, motorcycles, and power equipment, headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan.
Honda has been the world's largest motorcycle manufacturer since 1959, reaching a producti ...
which put an end to an eight-year title drought that was eluded largely due to the domination of Mercedes from 2014 to 2020.
From 2006 to 2011, Mateschitz also owned
Team Red Bull
Red Bull Racing Team, also known as Team Red Bull, was a NASCAR team owned by Red Bull founders Dietrich Mateschitz and Chaleo Yoovidhya. The team was based in Mooresville, North Carolina in the United States and was managed by Jay Frye. The te ...
who competed in the
NASCAR
The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and ...
Sprint Cup Series and the
K&N Pro Series East.
In late 2004, he bought the
A1-Ring racing circuit, which had formerly hosted the Formula One
Austrian Grand Prix
The Austrian Grand Prix (german: Großer Preis von Österreich) is a Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile sanctioned motor racing event that was held in , –, –, and then returned to the Formula One calendar in .
History
The A ...
, and renamed it the
Red Bull Ring
The Red Bull Ring is a motorsport race track in Spielberg, Styria, Austria.
The race circuit was founded as Österreichring (translation: Austrian Circuit) and hosted the Austrian Grand Prix for 18 consecutive years, from to . It was later s ...
. The circuit re-opened in May 2011 and hosted a round of the
2011 Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters season. Although Mateschitz had stated that there were no plans for it to return to the Formula One calendar, in December 2012 Red Bull notified the
Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile
The Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA; en, International Automobile Federation) is an association established on 20 June 1904 to represent the interests of motoring organisations and motor car users. It is the governing body for ...
they would be open to hosting a Grand Prix. In July 2013, Red Bull announced the return of the Austrian Grand Prix to the Formula One World Championship in 2014. The race took place on
22 June 2014 and was won by
Nico Rosberg, driving for Mercedes.
Football and ice hockey
In April 2005, he bought the Austrian
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 ...
club SV Austria Salzburg and in March 2006, he bought the American club MetroStars; both clubs were subsequently renamed after his famous drink, as
Red Bull Salzburg and
New York Red Bulls
The New York Red Bulls are an American professional soccer club based in the New York metropolitan area. The Red Bulls compete in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the Eastern Conference. The club was established in October 1994 and be ...
, respectively. In 2007, Red Bull founded
Red Bull Brasil, a football team based in
Campinas
Campinas (, ''Plains'' or ''Meadows'') is a Brazilian municipality in São Paulo State, part of the country's Southeast Region. According to the 2020 estimate, the city's population is 1,213,792, making it the fourteenth most populous Brazilian ...
, and in 2019 the company acquired Clube Atlético Bragantino also in the
state of São Paulo. In 2008, Red Bull founded
Red Bull Ghana
Red Bull Ghana was a Ghanaian professional football club and academy based in Sogakope, South Tongu District, Ghana, which was founded in 2008 and abolished in 2014. The club was owned by Red Bull and last played in Division One League Zone 3B.
...
, a football academy in
Sogakope
Sogakofe (also known as Sogakope) is the capital of South Tongu district, a district in the Volta Region of Ghana. It is home to the lower Volta Bridge which connects Sogakofe to Sokpoe. The town is mostly known for its river tourism and Mass br ...
which was sold to Dutch club
Feyenoord
Feyenoord Rotterdam () is a Dutch professional football club in Rotterdam, which plays in the Eredivisie, the top tier in Dutch football. Founded as Wilhelmina in 1908, the club changed to various names before settling on being called after i ...
in 2014.
In May 2009, he initiated a German football club called
RB Leipzig
RasenBallsport Leipzig e.V. (), commonly known as RB Leipzig, and colloquially referred to as Red Bull Leipzig, is a German professional football club based in Leipzig, Saxony. The club was founded in 2009 by the initiative of the company Red Bul ...
after buying the license from
SSV Markranstädt
SSV Markranstädt is a German association football club from the city of Markranstädt, Saxony near Leipzig. It is part of a larger sports club that also has departments for badminton, cycle ball, gymnastics, table tennis, and volleyball.
__T ...
to play in the
Oberliga, the fourth tier of the
German football league system
The German football league system, or league pyramid, refers to the hierarchically interconnected league system for association football in Germany that in the 2016–17 season consisted of 2,235 leagues in up to 13 levels having 31,645 team ...
. The team rose to the top-tier
Bundesliga
The Bundesliga (; ), sometimes referred to as the Fußball-Bundesliga () or 1. Bundesliga (), is a professional association football league in Germany. At the top of the German football league system, the Bundesliga is Germany's primary footb ...
in 2016, made 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 ...
semi-finals in 2020 and won the
DFB-Pokal
The DFB-Pokal ( is a German knockout football cup competition held annually by the German Football Association (DFB). Sixty-four teams participate in the competition, including all clubs from the Bundesliga and the 2. Bundesliga. It is considered ...
in 2022.
He was also the owner of the ice hockey clubs
EC Red Bull Salzburg
EC Red Bull Salzburg is a professional ice hockey team based in Salzburg, Austria, that currently plays in the ICE Hockey League. The club play their home games at the Eisarena Salzburg.
History
The history of ice hockey in Salzburg at the high ...
and
EHC Red Bull München
Eishockeyclub Red Bull München (or EHC Red Bull München; English: ''Munich Red Bulls Ice Hockey Club'') is a professional ice hockey team based in Munich, Germany. The club is a member of the Deutsche Eishockey Liga (DEL), the highest level of pl ...
, which were acquired and rebranded in 2000 and 2012 respectively.
Philanthropy
Mateschitz was co-founder of the ''Wings for Life'' foundation that supports
spinal cord
The spinal cord is a long, thin, tubular structure made up of nervous tissue, which extends from the medulla oblongata in the brainstem to the lumbar region of the vertebral column (backbone). The backbone encloses the central canal of the sp ...
research together with
Heinz Kinigadner. Since 2014, the foundation has organised the
Wings for Life World Run
The Wings for Life World Run is a running competition held on the first weekend of May since 2014 to collect funds for the not-for-profit foundation ''Wings for Life''. The entry fee goes completely to Spinal Cord Research. It became the largest ...
to raise funds.
Mateschitz personally donated 70 million euros to
Paracelsus Medical University for a research center on spinal cord injuries.
He also initiated the
World Stunt Awards
The Taurus World Stunt Awards is a yearly award ceremony held midyear that honors stunt performers in movies. It is held each year in Los Angeles. The first awards were given out in 2001. The deciding committee has been around since the year 2000. ...
, an annual fundraiser to benefit his Taurus Foundation, which, according to its website, helps injured
stunt
A stunt is an unusual and difficult physical feat or an act requiring a special skill, performed for artistic purposes usually on television, theaters, or cinema. Stunts are a feature of many action films. Before computer generated imagery sp ...
professionals.
Personal life and death
Mateschitz never married,
but had a son named Mark who was born in the early 1990s.
As of the time of Mateschitz's death, his son was the managing director of one of his investment companies. Mateschitz rarely gave interviews, and refused to answer questions about his son.
[ He remained a reclusive figure maintaining low profile despite his heavy involvement with Formula One. He was also known for his simplicity often seen wearing casual dresswear preferably in ]jeans
Jeans are a type of pants or trousers made from denim or dungaree cloth. Often the term "jeans" refers to a particular style of trousers, called "blue jeans", with copper-riveted pockets which were invented by Jacob W. Davis in 1871 and pa ...
and sunglasses
Sunglasses or sun glasses (informally called shades or sunnies; more names Sunglasses#Other names, below) are a form of Eye protection, protective eyewear designed primarily to prevent bright sunlight and high-energy visible light from damagin ...
. Mateschitz was in a relationship for two years with the mother of his son, and later had a long-term partner named Marion Feichtner.[ He was known as a recluse, stating "I don't believe in 50 friends. I believe in a smaller number. Nor do I care about society events. It's the most senseless use of time. When I do go out, from time to time, it's just to convince myself again that I'm not missing a lot".][
He held a pilot's licence and enjoyed flying a ]Falcon 900
The Dassault Falcon 900, commonly abbreviated as the F900, is a French-built corporate trijet aircraft made by Dassault Aviation.
Development
The Falcon 900 is a development of the Falcon 50, itself a development of the earlier Falcon 20. Th ...
and a Piper Super Cub. He had his own hangar with a collection of old planes, including the last Douglas DC-6B to be produced, and which once belonged to Yugoslav Marshal Josip Broz Tito
Josip Broz ( sh-Cyrl, Јосип Броз, ; 7 May 1892 – 4 May 1980), commonly known as Tito (; sh-Cyrl, Тито, links=no, ), was a Yugoslav communist revolutionary and statesman, serving in various positions from 1943 until his death ...
.
Mateschitz and his Bundesliga
The Bundesliga (; ), sometimes referred to as the Fußball-Bundesliga () or 1. Bundesliga (), is a professional association football league in Germany. At the top of the German football league system, the Bundesliga is Germany's primary footb ...
club RB Leipzig
RasenBallsport Leipzig e.V. (), commonly known as RB Leipzig, and colloquially referred to as Red Bull Leipzig, is a German professional football club based in Leipzig, Saxony. The club was founded in 2009 by the initiative of the company Red Bul ...
faced backlash in 2017 over comments made in a '' Kleine Zeitung'' interview in which he suggested that Austria should close its borders to refugees and expressed support for Donald Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.
Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of P ...
and other populist positions. He went on to strongly criticize both the Government of Germany and the Government of Austria
The Government of Austria (german: Bundesregierung der Republik Österreich) is the executive cabinet of the Republic of Austria. It consists of the chancellor, who is the head of government, the vice chancellor and the ministers.
Appointm ...
for their policies during the 2015 European migrant crisis.
Mateschitz lived in Fuschl am See, Austria but also owned the island of Laucala
Laucala (pronounced ) is one of a triplet of small islands that lie to the east of Thurston Point on the island of Taveuni in Fiji. The privately owned islands are the site of the Laucala Resort.
The total land area of the main island is . It is ...
in Fiji
Fiji ( , ,; fj, Viti, ; Fiji Hindi: फ़िजी, ''Fijī''), officially the Republic of Fiji, is an island country in Melanesia, part of Oceania in the South Pacific Ocean. It lies about north-northeast of New Zealand. Fiji consis ...
, which he bought from the Forbes family for £7 million.["Big man drives forward energy-packed brand" by Peter Klinger. ''The Times (London)'', 25 February 2006.] He spent millions on acquiring and conserving houses and castles in the Austrian Alps
The Central Eastern Alps (german: Zentralalpen or Zentrale Ostalpen), also referred to as Austrian Central Alps (german: Österreichische Zentralalpen) or just Central Alps, comprise the main chain of the Eastern Alps in Austria and the adjacent ...
, saying "I want to enjoy these places myself, but I also want to take care of them".
He died following a long period of fighting pancreatic cancer
Pancreatic cancer arises when cells in the pancreas, a glandular organ behind the stomach, begin to multiply out of control and form a mass. These cancerous cells have the ability to invade other parts of the body. A number of types of pancr ...
at his home in St. Wolfgang im Salzkammergut
St. Wolfgang im Salzkammergut is a market town in central Austria, in the Salzkammergut region of Upper Austria, named after Saint Wolfgang of Regensburg.
Geography
The town is located in central Austria. It is on the northern shore of the Wo ...
on 22 October 2022, at age 78.
See also
* '' The World's Billionaires''
References
External links
Forbes.com: The Soda With Buzz
Times Online: Big man drives forward energy-packed brand – The media-shy mogul behind the Red Bull phenomenon
Die-Wirtschaftsnews: The man beyond Red Bull (German)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mateschitz, Dietrich
1944 births
2022 deaths
Austrian billionaires
Austrian chief executives
Austrian drink industry businesspeople
Austrian football chairmen and investors
Austrian mass media people
Austrian motorsport people
Austrian people of Croatian descent
Chairmen and investors of football clubs in Austria
Chairmen and investors of football clubs in Germany
Chairmen and investors of soccer clubs in the United States
Dietrich Mateschitz
Formula One team owners
Red Bull people
Red Bull Racing
Scuderia Toro Rosso
Vienna University of Economics and Business alumni
Deaths from pancreatic cancer