Traudl Engelhorn Biography & Net Worth

Traudl Engelhorn Biography & Net Worth

Traudl Engelhorn is a member of the famous German Engelhorn family, whose patriarch, in the person of Fredrich Engelhorn, established the multinational chemical company BASF in 1865. Although Traudl has had her own personal life history and professions, she is mostly recognized for her marriage to the late Peter Engelhorn, whose brother, Curt managed the family business Boehringer Mannheim for more than three decades and succeeded in growing it to become one of the largest biochemical and pharmaceutical businesses in the whole of Germany.

Early Life: Childhood, Education

Not much is known concerning Traudl’s childhood, and details of her education are also missing from the media at this time. However, we do know that she was born in Vienna, Austria, in the year 1927.

Professional Life: Initial Career, Marriage & Philanthropy

She was a publisher and editor in Vienna, Austria, before Peter Engelhorn found her and got married to her. After their marriage, she dedicated most of her time to charity, donating to and sponsoring academic and cultural circles.

Peter Engelhorn died in 1991. He was the great-grandson of Friedrich Engelhorn and a cousin of Curt Engelhorn. He was a partner in the former medical company Boehringer Mannheim (now known as Roche). In 1955, he married Traudl Vechiatto, an editor and publisher originally from Vienna. Their marriage resulted in the birth of four daughters.

Traudl Engelhorn-Vechiatto instituted the non-profit foundation, Brombeeren Foundation in 2013 in memory of her late husband. An incorporated not-for-profit organization, the Brombeeren Foundation sponsors the activities of the Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen in research and scholarship, as well as in the fields of cultural history and fine arts. Traudl Engelhorn, who many regard as a quiet donor, sponsor, and patron in educational and cultural circles, still maintains very close ties to Mannheim. Her late husband was a co-founder of the Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen’s Society of Friends.

Since Peter Engelhorn’s passing in 1991, Mrs. Engelhorn has progressively devoted herself to several foundations and associations. Through her material and immaterial aids, she, along with her offspring, has been and is supporting several scholarly conferences, research projects, publications, and cultural projects in fields of education, art, music, among others. She also supports young scientists working in life sciences, biotechnology, and genetic engineering.

About the Company

BASF, which is an acronym for B adische A nilin- und S odaF abrik (translated from German to ”Baden Aniline and Soda Factory”),  was founded on 6 April 1865 by Friedrich Engelhorn in Mannheim, Baden.

It is a German international chemical company and the world’s leading chemical producer. The BASF Group comprises of affiliates and joint ventures in more than eighty countries of the world and operates six integrated production locations and 390 other production sites in Africa, Europe, Asia, Australia, and the Americas. Its headquarters is sited in Ludwigshafen, Germany. BASF has customers in more than 190 countries of the world and supplies products to a wide range of industries. Despite its global presence and size, BASF has received slight public attention since it stopped producing and marketing BASF-branded consumer electronics products in the 1990s. The company, at the end of 2019, had employed 117,628 people, with more than 54,000 in Germany, thereby being a job provider to a sizable number of the population.

In 2019, BASF posted sales of more than $59 billion and recorded income from operations before special items of roughly $4.5 billion. The company is said to be currently expanding its international activities, particularly focusing on Asia. Between 1990 and 2005, BASF invested $5.6 billion in Asia, for example in spots near Mangalore, India, and Nanjing and Shanghai, China. The company is traded on the Zurich Stock Exchange, Frankfurt Stock Exchange, and London Stock Exchange. It removed its ADR from the list of the New York Stock Exchange in September 2007.

BASF SE operates in a range of markets. Its business is organized in multiple segments, including Oil and Gas, Chemicals, Agricultural Solutions, Plastics, Functional Solutions, and Performance Products. It is a renowned producer of a variety of chemicals such as industrial gases, glues, basic petrochemicals, resins, solvents, amines, inorganic chemicals, and electronic-grade chemicals. The most important consumers for this segment are the automotive, textile, pharmaceutical, and construction industries. The company’s plastic products include top-grade materials in urethanes, thermoplastics, and foams

BASF produces a variety of performance chemicals, functional polymers, and coatings. These include raw materials for textile and leather chemicals, detergents, paper chemicals, pigments and raw materials for adhesives. Patrons of this segment are the leather, coatings, printing, automotive, oil, construction materials, paper, packaging, detergents, textile, and sanitary products industries. The company’s Functional Solutions division includes the Catalysts, Coatings, and Construction Chemicals segments. These units develop customer-specific products, directed at the construction and automotive industries. BASF also supplies agricultural products and chemicals such as insecticides, fungicides, herbicides, and seed treatment products.

BASF also researches nutrigenomics. It opened a new crop technology center in Limburgerhof, Germany back in 2016.  The company was cooperating with the renowned Monsanto Company in the research and development, as well as the marketing of biotechnology. In correlation to this work, BASF SE has licensed more than a few gene-editing tools including CRISPR Cpf1 and CRISPR Cas9. The BASF Plant Science subsidiary manufactures the Amflora and Starch Potato genetically altered potato with reduced amylose. In the United Kingdom in 2010, BASF carried out a Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs sanctioned trials of genetically modified potatoes. Starch Potato was approved for use in the United States back in 2014.  Furthermore, BASF explores for oil and gas and also produces it through its subsidiary Wintershall Dea. In Eastern and Central Europe, Wintershall collaborates with its Russian partner Gazprom.

Traudl Engelhorn Net Worth: Salary, Income Sources, Assets

Born Traudl Vechiatto in Vienna in 1927, the German businessperson and wife of BASF SE heir Peter Engelhorn, Traudl Engelhorn, is currently entitled to a net worth of $3.7 billion. The 87-year-old German billionaire is an elegant and classy woman who comes from a prominent industrial clan. She never lets her fame get the most of her, and prefers to stay away from the media and unnecessary publicity. Her fortune has enabled her claim the 462nd place on the world’s richest persons’ list. She is also the 32nd richest person in Germany, courtesy of her inheritance from her late husband Peter, who owned a sizable stake in the family’s business before his demise.