The billionaire owner of engineering services group Altrad has been found guilty of corruption charges in relation to his company’s sponsorship of the French national rugby team.
Judges in Paris handed the company’s founder and president, Mohed Altrad, an 18-month suspended jail sentence and a €50,000 (£43,000) fine after he allegedly made payments to a French rugby executive to secure a jersey sponsorship deal.
Dubbed the “king of scaffolding”, Mr Altrad’s eponymous industrial services group employs more than 62,000 people worldwide by recent count, and is a well-known provider of scaffolding and other oilfield services across the North Sea energy sector.
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The corruption case centred on a €180,000 payment made by an Altrad group holding company to a firm owned by the head of France’s rugby federation, Bernard Laporte.
Lawyers alleged that in exchange for the payment Mr Laporte helped Altrad secure the €1.8m national sponsorship deal and lobbied for a bid made by the billionaire to buy a stake in a UK rugby team.
Mr Laporte was also convicted and was given a two-year suspended prison sentence and a €75,000 euro fine.
He later stepped down as vice-chairman of World Rugby, an upset that comes just months before France hosts next year’s Rugby World Cup.
The New Zealand national team – who also carry the Altrad logo as part of a separate six-year sponsorship deal signed last year – are also reportedly seeking urgent meetings with the company.
Wrongdoing denied
In Mr Altrad’s case, judges said they would not impose an outright management ban on the company founder – who also owns the French Top 14 winners Montpellier – so as not to cause any “disproportionate” consequences given his lack of any prior convictions.
Both men have denied any wrongdoing, while Mr Altrad’s lawyer said his client will consider whether to appeal the verdict over the coming days.
“Mohed Altrad never intended to illegally obtain any favors from Bernard Laporte,” lawyer Antoine Vey said in a statement.
“The Altrad group is neither concerned nor impacted by this ruling and Mohed Altrad will continue to invest his time and energy in management missions for his group, its employees and partners.”
Altrad in the North Sea
Born in the Syrian desert, Mr Altrad was orphaned at an early age and as a Bedouin was not permitted to attend school. After largely teaching himself to read he went on to study in Raqqa, and later France.
He worked as an engineer for Alcatel and Thomson in his early career, before later taking a post at Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) in 1980.
After returning to France in 1985 he created an IT business and shortly after purchased a small scaffolding firm, Mefran, which would later become the basis of the Altrad group.
The company has become a well-known name in the North Sea in recent years, thanks to a string of contract wins and an aggressive expansion plan that has seen it acquire multiple oilfield contractors across the patch.
This year has seen the takeover of Muehlhan’s oil and gas business in Denmark and the UK, as well as a buyout of global services rival Sparrows Group, taking on nearly 3,000 staff from the two firms in the process.
In September, Altrad also closed its acquisition of Crawley-based DoosanBabcock, adding a further 4,000 workers to its existing 52,000-strong global staff base.
