The former owner and CEO of Head holds degrees in both economics and engineering from Stockholm University and the Royal Institute of Technology.
Johan Eliasch, 63, is a Swede who has made his way to Whitehall, acquiring British citizenship, by way of Austria.
Eliasch is best known for his long tenure as CEO (1995-2021) of Head – itself expatriated, albeit from the US, where founder Howard Head had pioneered the use of aluminum in both skis and tennis racquets. By the time Eliasch took the helm in Austria, though, Head was falling behind other brands (such as Rossignol, Salomon), so he farmed out the manufacture of sportswear and golf goods and focused on in-house advancements for skiing and tennis goods.
Eliasch told the LA Times in 1998 that when he bought the company, in 1995, what was then called Head Tyrolia Mares (HTM) had an operating loss of $119 million on sales of $401 million. Two years later it had an operating surplus of $9 million on sales of $287 million. And later, he would go on to sign endorsement deals with Novak Djokovic, among others.
In 2021, stepping down as CEO, he became both Head’s Chairman and the President of the International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS), under whose auspices he then gained membership to the IOC. And the list goes on.
He was Chairman at Aman Resorts for four years and remains Chairman of ECJ Holdings, London Films and the Saatchi Gallery (London). He is also President of the Global Strategy Forum (UK); has held non-executive chairmanships at Investcorp Europe, Starr Managing Agents and elsewhere; and has sat on the Advisory Boards of the Société du Louvre, Brasilinvest, The Centre for Social Justice (UK) and the Stockholm Resilience Centre. His chief concern nowadays, however, is the Earth’s climate.
Eliasch is currently the Prime Minister’s Special Representative on Deforestation and Clean Energy, having published in 2008 – on commission from then-Prime Minister Gordon Brown – the so-called Eliasch Review, which sought to measure “the scale of finance required to produce significant reductions in forest carbon emissions.” He founded Brazil’s Rainforest Trust in 2005 and is the co-founder and Co-Chairman of Cool Earth, another association devoted to rainforests.
Eliasch holds degrees in economics and engineering from Stockholm University and the Royal Institute of Technology, as well as a patent for a mobile-phone-related indirect communication system and method.
According to the IOC, he enjoys skiing, golf, tennis, sailing, football, ice hockey and motor racing. In curling he was Stockholm’s Junior Champion in 1977, winner of the Bill Ross Trophy in 1978 and Swedish Regional Champion in 1979.
Within FIS he is President of the Marc Hodler Foundation, headquartered in Switzerland and devoted to the advancement of skiing. Additionally, he is a Council Member of the Winter Olympic Federations, was formerly on the Advisory Board of the British Olympic Association and was formerly Director of Special Olympics Great Britain.
Before turning 40 Eliasch was selected for the Young Global Leaders program at the World Economic Forum (WEF). There have been about 1,400 such Leaders since the program’s inception, in 2005. Among them are former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, former Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and current French President Emmanuel Macron.
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