Ikea fortune falls to no one after billionaire founder’s death

When Ikea’s Ingvar Kamprad died Saturday at age 91, he was ranked No. 8 on the  Bloomberg Billionaires Index thanks to his control of a global retail fortune valued at USD58.7 billion.

It was a distinction he refuted, having decades earlier placed control of the world’s largest furniture seller into a network of foundations and holding companies designed to secure the long-term independence and survival of the Ikea concept.

The structure, which he established in the 1980s, assures that the Almhult, Sweden-based company stays outside the family’s direct control, leaving his heirs with a more meager fortune derived from family-owned Ikano Group. The group operates a collection of finance, real estate, manufacturing and retail businesses – including Ikea stores in southeast Asia – and reported total assets of 8 billion euros ($9.9 billion) and a solvency ratio of “close to 30 percent” in 2016, according to its website.

Kamprad’s structure put ownership of most Ikea stores into the Stichting Ingka Foundation, a Dutch entity with the stated purpose of “supporting innovation” in design, according to its founding statute at the time. The company’s trademarks, brand and concept were placed under the ultimate control of Vaduz, Liechtenstein- based Interogo Foundation whose subsidiary, Inter Ikea, is the global Ikea franchisor.

“Interogo Foundation is managed by a Foundation Council (Stiftungsrat) consisting of at least two members and a Supervisory Council (Beirat), as a principle consisting of seven members,” Anders Bylund, Interogo’s head of communications wrote in a Jan. 29 email. “The Kamprad family members in the Supervisory Councils have been and shall always be in minority.”

Though called a foundation, the mission of the Stichting Ingka is only partly philanthropic. Its statutes also allow for profits to be reinvested in the company, according to Per Heggenes, the chief executive of the Ikea Foundation.

The structure was designed to ensure Ikea, in its present form, would long outlive its founder. Trust experts say the set-up emphasizes continuity by making it impossible for an individual, whether a manager or heir, to assume control after Kamprad’s death. The Bloomberg Billionaires Index attributed the fortune to Kamprad in recognition of his role as founder with control over the entire structure.

Kamprad was “not interested in money,” Heggenes told Bloomberg in 2012. “That is clear from the way he structured the ownership.”Devon Pendleton, Bloomberg