Who is Mike Lynch, the UK tech tycoon missing after Bayesian superyacht sinks off Sicily coast?

British tech tycoon Mike Lynch was enjoying the start of his “second life”, after a year under house arrest, when his multimillion-dollar superyacht was struck by a freak tornado, capsized and sunk off the coast of Sicily on Monday morning.

Dr Lynch is one of six people — including his 18-year-old daughter, Hannah — feared dead after his 183-foot-long vessel, called Bayesian, sank in waters near Porticello, south of Palermo, just before 5am local time on Monday.

It is a tragic end to what was meant to be a pleasure cruise the 59-year-old organised for his loved ones, lawyers, and colleagues to celebrate the end of his decade-long battle against fraud charges in the US — the last year of which was spent under house arrest.

In June, Dr Lynch was acquitted of 15 counts of fraud that he faced over the $US11 billion purchase of his company, Autonomy, by major Silicon Valley player Hewlett-Packard (more commonly known as HP) in 2011.

He and his co-accused Stephen Chamberlain — former were extradited to the US in May 2023, where they faced two decades in jail if convicted. The pair denied any wrongdoing.

Their trial began in March 2024, and after 11 weeks a San Francisco jury cleared them of all charges.

Dr Lynch returned to the UK with a new lease on life and said that he looked forward to “getting back to what I love: my family and innovating in my field”.

It’s bizarre, but now you have a second life. The question is, what do you want to do with it?

But freedom would be short-lived for the men. Dr Lynch is feared dead after Monday’s yacht incident. And days before, in a cruel twist of fate, Mr Chamberlain was hit by a car while out running in Cambridgeshire on Saturday. He was placed on life support but died on Monday.

Before his name was sullied by the HP debacle, Dr Lynch was hailed as a visionary, dubbed the “British Bill Gates” for his tech innovations.

He was born in Ireland in 1965 and raised by his parents, a nurse and firefighter, near Chelmsford in Essex.

He studied physics, mathematics and biochemistry at Cambridge University, coming to specialise in adaptive pattern recognition — his doctoral thesis on artificial neural networks is reportedly one of the university’s most widely read.

In the 1980s, while studying for his PhD, he launched his first startup, Lynett Systems Ltd — financed with a £2000 loan negotiated in a bar — which produced designs and audio products for the music industry.

In 1991, he founded Cambridge Neurodynamics which specialised in computer-based fingerprint recognition software which was eventually used by police. This software led Dr Lynch to launch Autonomy in 1996, which would go on to become one of Britain’s biggest tech firms.

Dr Lynch would go on to become a science adviser to Britain’s then-prime minister David Cameron and a non-executive director of the BBC. He was also awarded an OBE in 2006 for services to enterprise.

In October 2011 Autonomy was sold to HP for more than $US11 billion. Dr Lynch made an estimated $US800 million from the sale, but it would almost be his ruin.

In November 2012, HP announced an $US8.8 billion writedown of assets due to “serious accounting improprieties, disclosure failures and outright misrepresentations” at Autonomy which it said had occurred before its purchase that artificially inflated its value.

According to evidence presented at Dr Lynch’s 2024 trial, HP valued Autonomy at $US46 billion ($68.3 billion) in the months before acquiring it.

Dr Lynch denied the allegations and would spend the next 11 years defending his reputation in UK and US courtrooms.

Throughout his ongoing court battles, some prosecutors portrayed the tycoon as an iron-fisted boss obsessed with hitting revenue targets, even if it meant doing so through dubious means.

He denied all allegations.

He was also said to have indulged his fondness of James Bond via his companies, reportedly naming conference rooms after 007’s enemies. Autonomy reportedly also had a piranha tank in the atrium — a nod to You Only Live Once.

The portrait of a tyrannical leader painted of Dr Lynch in court seemingly ran counter to that painted by himself: A married father of two daughters, who reportedly spent his spare time breeding koi carp and building model railways.

He and his wife Angela Bacares, who was one of 15 people rescued from the ill-fated Bayesian, were said to be worth £500 million ($965 million) in the latest Sunday Times Rich List.

Dr Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter — who was due to study English at Oxford University — were reported missing after the freak storm struck the £30 million ($60 million) yacht on Monday morning, snapping its 250-foot-long mast and causing it to sink in minutes.

Divers found the wreckage of the Bayesian on the seabed some 50 metres below the surface. A man’s body, believed to be the yacht’s chef was found underwater nearby.