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Robert Holmes à Court
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Robert Holmes à Court
Michael Robert Hamilton Holmes à Court (27 July 1937 – 2 September 1990) was a South African-born Australian businessman who became Australia's first billionaire. He died suddenly of heart failure in 1990 at the age of 53.
A great-great-grandson of William à Court-Holmes, 2nd Baron Heytesbury, and a grand-nephew of William Frederick Holmes à Court, 3rd Baron Heytesbury, Holmes à Court was one of the world's most feared corporate raiders through the 1980s, having increased his properties single-handedly from virtually nothing to a diversified resources and media group with an estimated value immediately before the 1987 stock market crash of about A$2 billion. Shareholders in the company enjoyed enormous investment growth. Holmes à Court's horse Black Knight won the 1984 Melbourne Cup.
Holmes à Court died intestate, and his estate was to be divided one-third for his widow Janet, and the remainder equally among their four children, who include Peter, Paul and Simon.
Holmes à Court was born on 27 July 1937 in Johannesburg, South Africa, the son of Peter Worsley Holmes à Court and Ethnee Celia, née Cumming. His grandfather was Henry Worsley Holmes à Court, who was a brother of William Holmes à Court, 3rd Baron Heytesbury and Leonard Holmes à Court, 4th Baron Heytesbury. He spent much of his early life in Southern Rhodesia. He was educated at Cordwalles Preparatory School and Michaelhouse School in Natal, South Africa. There he earned money selling his schoolmates photographs he had taken of them, and by driving them home in exchange for their travel allowances.
Holmes à Court studied forestry in New Zealand at the University of Auckland and Massey University, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Agricultural Science in 1962. He then moved to Perth, Western Australia, in 1961 to study law at the University of Western Australia, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Laws in 1965. He married science teacher Janet Ranford on 18 May 1966. Holmes à Court was admitted to practise on 17 April 1968. He then worked as a barrister and solicitor. His law practice in Perth was sometimes in partnership with Nicholas Hasluck.
Holmes à Court entered the corporate stage by accident in 1970, when his law firm was asked to act as administrative receiver of a small publicly listed company, Western Australian Worsted & Woollen Mills (later Albany Woollen Mills, also known as AWM or WA Wool). The company was the single largest employer in the regional city of Albany. In what he later described as his most challenging "takeover" — probably because it was his first —, he found a way to invest $500,000 in the ailing business, on the proviso that the Minister for Industry, Charles Court, would persuade the Government of Western Australia to forgive the $500,000 in loans they had made.
The source of funds for his initial investment in WA Wool were never made clear, since the $75,000 deposit for the purchase price of WA Wool shares came from a bank account that he shared with the partners in his law firm at the time, and his partners asked for these funds to be repaid. Nevertheless, since Holmes à Court had no other apparent source of income at the time, a possibility is that his mother Ethnee financed his first foray into business, since she had stood to inherit from her mother Florence, who in turn had stood to inherit from her second husband H.R. Cumming, a wealthy Rhodesian landowner, businessman and colleague of Cecil Rhodes. Cumming had helped raise Ethnee during her childhood on his estate outside Gweru. As an adult and while living in Rhodesia and South Africa, Ethnee had also established and sold both a riding school and a game lodge in Chobe, and eventually sold several properties that she owned as investments giving the funds to Robert to manage on her migration to Australia in 1967.
After acquiring WA Wool, Holmes à Court made it more competitive by reducing production costs, mainly by installing the latest wool milling and weaving machinery. This was acquired on favourable terms from a leading Belgian equipment manufacturer, which was keen to enter the Australian market at that time. He now controlled a company listed on the Australian Securities Exchange, and from there he began to gain control of a string of small businesses, including Westate Electrical Industries.
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Robert Holmes à Court
Michael Robert Hamilton Holmes à Court (27 July 1937 – 2 September 1990) was a South African-born Australian businessman who became Australia's first billionaire. He died suddenly of heart failure in 1990 at the age of 53.
A great-great-grandson of William à Court-Holmes, 2nd Baron Heytesbury, and a grand-nephew of William Frederick Holmes à Court, 3rd Baron Heytesbury, Holmes à Court was one of the world's most feared corporate raiders through the 1980s, having increased his properties single-handedly from virtually nothing to a diversified resources and media group with an estimated value immediately before the 1987 stock market crash of about A$2 billion. Shareholders in the company enjoyed enormous investment growth. Holmes à Court's horse Black Knight won the 1984 Melbourne Cup.
Holmes à Court died intestate, and his estate was to be divided one-third for his widow Janet, and the remainder equally among their four children, who include Peter, Paul and Simon.
Holmes à Court was born on 27 July 1937 in Johannesburg, South Africa, the son of Peter Worsley Holmes à Court and Ethnee Celia, née Cumming. His grandfather was Henry Worsley Holmes à Court, who was a brother of William Holmes à Court, 3rd Baron Heytesbury and Leonard Holmes à Court, 4th Baron Heytesbury. He spent much of his early life in Southern Rhodesia. He was educated at Cordwalles Preparatory School and Michaelhouse School in Natal, South Africa. There he earned money selling his schoolmates photographs he had taken of them, and by driving them home in exchange for their travel allowances.
Holmes à Court studied forestry in New Zealand at the University of Auckland and Massey University, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Agricultural Science in 1962. He then moved to Perth, Western Australia, in 1961 to study law at the University of Western Australia, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Laws in 1965. He married science teacher Janet Ranford on 18 May 1966. Holmes à Court was admitted to practise on 17 April 1968. He then worked as a barrister and solicitor. His law practice in Perth was sometimes in partnership with Nicholas Hasluck.
Holmes à Court entered the corporate stage by accident in 1970, when his law firm was asked to act as administrative receiver of a small publicly listed company, Western Australian Worsted & Woollen Mills (later Albany Woollen Mills, also known as AWM or WA Wool). The company was the single largest employer in the regional city of Albany. In what he later described as his most challenging "takeover" — probably because it was his first —, he found a way to invest $500,000 in the ailing business, on the proviso that the Minister for Industry, Charles Court, would persuade the Government of Western Australia to forgive the $500,000 in loans they had made.
The source of funds for his initial investment in WA Wool were never made clear, since the $75,000 deposit for the purchase price of WA Wool shares came from a bank account that he shared with the partners in his law firm at the time, and his partners asked for these funds to be repaid. Nevertheless, since Holmes à Court had no other apparent source of income at the time, a possibility is that his mother Ethnee financed his first foray into business, since she had stood to inherit from her mother Florence, who in turn had stood to inherit from her second husband H.R. Cumming, a wealthy Rhodesian landowner, businessman and colleague of Cecil Rhodes. Cumming had helped raise Ethnee during her childhood on his estate outside Gweru. As an adult and while living in Rhodesia and South Africa, Ethnee had also established and sold both a riding school and a game lodge in Chobe, and eventually sold several properties that she owned as investments giving the funds to Robert to manage on her migration to Australia in 1967.
After acquiring WA Wool, Holmes à Court made it more competitive by reducing production costs, mainly by installing the latest wool milling and weaving machinery. This was acquired on favourable terms from a leading Belgian equipment manufacturer, which was keen to enter the Australian market at that time. He now controlled a company listed on the Australian Securities Exchange, and from there he began to gain control of a string of small businesses, including Westate Electrical Industries.