Overclocker

Michelin is mourning the loss of company CEO Edouard Michelin, who died in a tragic boating accident while on a fishing trip off the l'Ile de Sein in northwest France. He was 43.

It was Edouard Michelin who took the company back to Formula 1, and who

authorized its departure at the end of this season in reaction to its

humiliation by the hand of FIA president Max Mosley in the wake of the 2005

U.S. Grand Prix fiasco.

He had headed the company’s management board since 1999.

The cause of the accident was not immediately clear, and the company said an investigation of the incident is underway. Michel Rollier, who had been managing partner along with Michelin, will reportedly take over the company.

Michelin graduated with an engineering degree from the Ecole Centrale de Paris, before joining his family's company in 1985.

He had a stint in the French navy from 1987 to 1988 before going back to the Michelin group where he held various posts before succeeding his father Francois as head of the company in 1999.

-Reuters contributed

Source: http://www.autoweek.com/apps/pbcs.dl.../60526003/1024