Autonomy, the company which is to the forefront of Hewlett Packard’s (HP) recently announced $8.8 billion charge for accounting improprieties, was founded by Carrick-on-Suir, Co Tipperary native Mr Mike Lynch.
Mr Lynch, whose hobbies have included breeding Koi carp and building model railways, and who studied engineering and mathematical computing at Cambridge University is presently resident in Britain. In 2009 his personal stake in Autonomy was reported as being in the area of $300 million.
Hewlett Packard, which purchased his company, Autonomy, last year, for a reported $10.3 billion, have now stated that it has launched an internal investigation into what they believed was “a wilful effort to mislead investors and potential buyers.” HP claim that a senior member of Autonomy’s leadership team came forward, following the departure of Mr Lynch, alleging that there had been a series of questionable accounting and business practices at Autonomy, prior to its acquisition by Hewlett Packard.
Mr Lynch, in a statement, has rejected these allegations, calling them false, while indicating that the company may have been mismanaged since it was acquired by its now owners Hewlett Packard.
Mr Lynch’s former company Autonomy, which once boasted that it had the capacity to take on Google, was originally conceived in 1996 and made him the first technology billionaire both in Britain and Ireland. His firm’s shares rose during the ‘Dot-com Bubble,‘ era between 1997 & 2000, often referred to as the era of ‘prefix investment.‘
The Securities and Exchange Commission and the Serious Fraud Office may now decide this case should merit deeper investigation.
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