Edouard Michelin killed in boat accident

A Michelin spokesman confirmed the news on Friday night. He said the Frenchman's body was found drowned at sea, near the island of Sein, off the coast of Finisterre in northwest France. Michelin was spending the weekend there, fishing for sea bass, when his boat inexplicably sank.

Local police said the circumstances of Michelin's death were unexplained and added it was still searching for the body of another unnamed local official, who was on the boat with Michelin.

Born in 1963, Michelin graduated with an engineering degree from Ecole Centrale de Paris before joining Michelin in 1985.

He was initially a production manager at the Pey-en-Velay factory in France before becoming CEO of Michelin North America.

Michelin became a managing partner in 1991, before joining Francois Michelin and Rene Zingraff in the company's headquarters at Clermont-Ferrand in 1993. He was appointed the company's head in June 1999.

More recently Michelin was recently critical of the FIA's approach to both his company and Formula One, and backed a withdrawal from the sport at the end of this season because he opposed plans to move to a control tyre in the sport.

"Results improve the image of the company as they are a tremendous test for research, but with a single supplier F1 will partly lose its high technology," he said at the end of the last year.

"We've always been against a lack of competition among tyre manufacturers. To ban competition is the first step towards a single engine and a single bodywork, that is progressively transforming current races into promotional races."