Hans Rausing | |
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Hans Rausing with Tetra Brik, 1963
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Born |
Gothenburg, Sweden |
25 March 1926
Nationality | Swedish |
Alma mater | Lund University |
Occupation | Businessman |
Known for | Tetra Pak |
Net worth | US$12.5 billion (June 2015) |
Spouse(s) | Märit Rausing |
Children | Lisbet, Sigrid, and Hans Kristian Rausing |
Parent(s) | Ruben Rausing |
Sir Hans Rausing, KBE (born 25 March 1926) is a Swedish businessman based in the United Kingdom. He made his fortune from his co-inheritance of Tetra Pak, a company founded by his father Ruben Rausing and currently the largest food packaging company in the world. In the Forbes world fortune ranking, Rausing was placed at number 83 with an estimated fortune of $US10 billion in 2011. According to Forbes, he was the second richest Swedish billionaire in 2013. As of July 2016[update], Forbes reported his net worth as $12.5B. As of 17 May 2013[update], Bloomberg Billionaires Index estimated Rausing's net worth to be $13.3 billion.
Rausing was born in Gothenburg in 1926 as the second son to industrialist Ruben Rausing and his wife Elisabeth (née Varenius). Rausing had two brothers, Gad and Sven.
Rausing studied Economics, Statistics and Russian at Lund University, graduating in 1948. In 1954, at the age of 28, Rausing was appointed Managing Director of Tetra Pak, while his brother Gad became Deputy Managing Director. Rausing retained this post until 1985, when he took over as Chairman of the Board. Rausing left Tetra Pak in 1993 and sold his 50% share of the company to Gad in 1995 in what was at the time called the largest private buyout ever in Europe.
Much of the enormous success of Tetra Pak in the 1970s and 1980s has been credited to the leadership of Hans and Gad Rausing, who literally took the company from a six-person family business to a global multi-national corporation. Over the course of his business career, Rausing became a specialist in Russian affairs and has made many private investments in both Russia and Ukraine. He was responsible for the Russian market within Tetra Pak, and negotiated the first Tetra Pak machine export to the then Soviet Union in 1959, eventually making Tetra Pak the largest foreign employer in Russia.