ICYMI: We’ve got new owners. Egyptian businessman Nassef Sawiris and American Wes Edens have acquired a reported 55% stake of Aston Villa Football Club through company NSWE (Nassef-Sawiris-Wes-Edens).
It felt like the inevitable had reached a breaking point when Dr. Tony Xia flew to the United Kingdom again for takeover talks. On Friday, Aston Villa transferred primary ownership groups and saw a dramatic shift in the club’s executive board.
Bloomberg News reported the exact figure is a 55% controlling share. Whereas you can find the official club statement here.
Who are Nassef Sawiris and Wes Edens?
Both are heavily-involved business magnates. Sawiris, 56 and born in Cairo, Egypt, is the Chief Executive Officer of Orascom Construction Industries, a Cairo-based, Dutch-listed multinational corporation focused on engineering, procurement, and construction.
Furthermore, he is the executive chairman of the investment/holding group NNS, which happens to be a significant shareholder of Adidas, where Sawiris sits on the Board of Directors. Very involved! Sawiris is an avid football fan and a citizen of both Egypt and Belgium, according to Villa’s website. He maintains residences in New York City and London, as well.
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His partner, Wes Edens, also 56, is a New York City native and current co-owner of the NBA franchise, the Milwaukee Bucks. Edens has his own equity group as well, Fortress Investment Group. Edens own an eSports team too – FlyQuest, a League of Legends competitor.
The combined net wealth of these two individuals is quite astounding. Sawiris is #251 on Forbes billionaire index with $6.8 billion in real time net worth. That’s good for #4 in all of Africa.
Edens, slightly less wealthy, but still very much a billionaire has taken a Co-Chairman position alongside Dr. Tony Xia with Sawiris as the Executive Chairman. Brian Little remains an advisor to the board, according to Villa’s “who’s who” section. Time will tell how this ownership group works out. There are a lot of competing interests having three-plus business partners, but Sawiris seems to have the final say.
This takeover is a huge sigh of relief that provides renewed optimism during Villa’s darkest time. Immediate cash flow concers have been erased, but the darned Financial Fair Play restrictions loom larger now.