British tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch, co-founder of Darktrace and Autonomy, is among six people presumed dead after the superyacht, Bayesian, sank off the coast of Sicily early Monday.
The 184-foot vessel was caught in a sudden and severe storm, with a waterspout striking it while it was anchored near Porticello, Italy. Out of the 22 people on board, 15 have been rescued, one was confirmed dead, and six remain missing, including Lynch and his 18-year-old daughter, Hannah.
Jonathan Bloomer, the chairman of Morgan Stanley International, and his wife, are also among the missing.
Founded in 2013 by senior members of the UK’s GCHQ and other intelligence agencies, Darktrace offers an AI-powered threat detection and response platform designed for enterprise IT environments, email systems, and operational technology (OT) environments. Invoke Capital, a company owned by Lynch, was an early investor in Darktrace, which eventually went public.
In April 2024, Darktrace agreed to sell itself to private equity giant Thoma Bravo for approximately $5.32 billion in cash.
Lynch had been accused of inflating the value of software firm Autonomy before being sold to to Hewlett Packard for $11.1 billion in 2011, but in June was acquitted of all charges. Reid Weingarten, who was part of Lynch’s legal team, has told news outlets that yacht trip was planned in celebration of the acquittal.
