After graduating, Ratcliffe worked at the oil firm BP but was fired after 3 days. The reason given for his dismissal was that he had eczema, which made him unfit to work around toxic chemicals. Ratcliffe went on to work for the fabric and chemicals producer
Courtaulds, where he stayed until his mid-thirties. In 1989, he joined US
private equity group
Advent International.
INEOS Ratcliffe was a co-founder of Inspec, which leased the former
BP Chemicals site in
Antwerp, Belgium. In 1998, Ratcliffe formed
INEOS in Hampshire to buy-out Inspec and the freehold of the Antwerp site. From this small base, using
high-yield debt to finance deals, Ratcliffe started buying unwanted operations from groups such as
ICI and BP, selecting targets based on their potential to double their earnings over a five-year period. In 2006, INEOS bought BP's refining and petrochemical arm Innovene, giving INEOS refineries and plants in Scotland, Italy, Germany, France, Belgium and Canada. The company acquired Norsk Hydro's polymers business in 2007, allowing INEOS to expand its presence in the European polymers market, particularly in polyvinyl chloride (PVC) production, significantly strengthening its market position. In April 2010, Ratcliffe moved INEOS's head office from Hampshire to
Rolle, Switzerland, cutting the amount of tax the company paid by £100 million a year. In 2015, Ratcliffe opened the UK headquarters of the chemicals and energy group in Knightsbridge, London, along with gas and oil trading, and other functions, saying he was "very cheerful about coming back to the UK". He was pleased with UK policy and London as a business base, and untroubled by the prospect of Brexit. Full year 2015
EBITDA was €577 million compared to €253 million for 2014. In the
Sunday Times Rich List 2018, he was named as the richest man in the UK, with a net worth of £21.05 billion. On 1 May 2019, Ratcliffe criticised the current government rules that say
fracking in Britain must be suspended every time a 0.5
magnitude tremor is detected, which has led to a
de facto ban on fracking, calling the government "pathetic".
Ineos Automotive was founded by Ratcliffe, initially to build a replacement for his Land Rover Defender. He unsuccessfully approached Jaguar Land Rover to buy the tooling to continue production after the original model was cancelled. Instead, in 2019 Ratcliffe formed partnerships with
BMW and
Magna Steyr to design and build a similar vehicle under the codename Projekt Grenadier. The 5-door Grenadier Station Wagon went into production in October 2022, followed by the launch of the Quartermaster utility vehicle in 2023.
Energy transition In October 2021, Ratcliffe announced plans to invest more than €2 billion (£1.7 billion) into electrolysis projects to make zero-carbon
green hydrogen across Europe. He said the first units will produce clean hydrogen through the electrolysis of water in Norway, powered by renewable electricity, and will serve as a hub to provide gas for the country's transport industry. This will be followed by projects in Germany and Belgium. Ratcliffe also intends to invest in France and the UK, where his hydrogen business will be headquartered.
Environmental pollution In March 2019, INEOS said it would close its Middlesbrough manufacturing plant, unless it is allowed to "defer compliance" with EU rules designed to prevent air and water pollution. An analysis of data from the Environment Agency (EA) also reveals the plant clocked up 176 permit violations between 2014 and 2017. INEOS director Tom Crotty said the firm "cannot justify" the investment required to comply with EU air and water pollution rules due to come into force in the coming years. INEOS has carried out small projects in
bio ethanol production using
Clostridium bacteria, but it has had problems because the
syngas has levels of
hydrogen cyanide too high for the bacteria to survive. INEOS sold its US plant to Alliance Bio-Products in 2017. ==Sport==