Update: 4:15PM Controversial business tycoon and former Australian of the year Alan Bond has died in a Perth hospital.
Mr Bond, 77, died following complications from heart surgery earlier this week.
He was part of the syndicate that won the America’s Cup in 1983, breaking the United States’ 132-year stranglehold on the title and ending the longest winning streak in the history of sport.
Mr Bond was one of WA’s most prominent business figures for more than a decade and at one stage was the nation’s largest brewer.
He also set up Australia’s first privately funded university.
But his empire crumbled in the 1990s, eventually being bankrupted for $622 million, which still stands as the second-largest personal bankruptcy in history.
He also served time in jail for siphoning off $1.2 billion to prop up his ailing Bond Corporation.
After a 19-year absence from the nation’s rich list, Mr Bond resurfaced in 2008 with a personal fortune estimated to be worth $265 million.
