English billionaire breaks silence on NZ Rugby legal battle

Ineos’ billionaire owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe has defended his organisation pulling out of its sponsorship agreement with New Zealand Rugby (NZR), as a legal battle between the two parties looms.

Speaking to the Daily Telegraph, Ratcliffe said European economic headwinds forced his organisation to cut back on investing in sport.

“I’m afraid life’s tough in trading in Europe, whether we like it or not,” Ratcliffe said. “I know it’s easy to just carry on, but I’m afraid life’s tough in the outside world in trading.”

NZR is suing Ineos for an alleged breach of contract that will leave the national organisation exposed to potential multimillion-dollar losses. Ratcliffe abruptly walked away from its lucrative sponsorship agreement three years early and failed to make its first payment in 2025.

Ineos agreed on a six-year sponsorship with NZR in 2022. Its branding is visible on the All Blacks, the Black Ferns and both sevens sides’ kit, but that branding will be removed.

The stoush could have widespread ramifications for the New Zealand rugby ecosystem with financial challenges already prevalent throughout the game, particularly at the grassroots level, and Ineos among the three major sponsors alongside Adidas and Altrad.

The Ineos deal is believed to be worth $8 million a year to New Zealand Rugby.

For Ratcliffe, the withdrawal comes as Ineos is forced to cut back on several fronts. The billionaire backer has also confirmed he has no intention to continue funding Sir Ben Ainslie’s America’s Cup challenge.

Elsewhere, he has also made cuts with English football giants Manchester United, including cutting meals to staff at the club’s training ground, and is seeking partners to back Ineos’ Grenadiers cycling team.

Ratcliffe said “life’s tough in trading in Europe”.

“Europe is a tough place for business at the moment. It’s not just for us — it’s for everybody in the car industry as well as the chemical industry.

“Really they’re pretty much the two biggest industries in Europe. Cars and chemicals are both about a trillion [euros in value], but they’re both having a tough time. At the moment, Ineos is the only chemical company in Europe that’s still building.

“We’re still investing, so we’re doing better than pretty much anybody else. But everybody’s under the cosh in Europe, because energy in the UK is five times the price of America.

“Electricity here is five times the price of electricity in America. Gas is five times the price of gas in America.

“And then we’ve got this glorious idea that some green lobby had of applying carbon taxes to finally put us out of business. America pays no carbon tax.

“If you look at one of our facilities, we’ve got some huge chemical facilities in Europe, and you compare that with an identical facility in America, it’s just tough because electricity is usually hugely more expensive, gas is hugely more expensive and then you’ve got a hundred million carbon tax on top of that.

“In America, they’re all busily investing in new facilities and creating new jobs, and then in Europe, everyone’s shutting down.”

Ineos is reportedly more than NZ$22 billion in debt, given its preferred method of self-financing projects — including the building of Europe’s biggest chemical plant, worth more than $10 billion, currently under way in Belgium.

Last month, NZ Rugby chief executive Mark Robinson told Newstalk ZB’s Elliott Smith that conversations began at the back end of 2024 and that they had been working on a resolution for “a little while”.

“There were some conversations at the back half of last year, so we’ve been working at this a little while, [we’re] obviously disappointed that it’s got to this stage where Ineos have breached and are wanting to walk away but by the same token we have to work quickly to protect our commercial interests and the wider game.

“We’re confident we have absolutely delivered on our agreement and we’re just going to have to work through it.”

This article was first published on nzherald.co.nz and is republished here with permission