Giorgio Furlani, Elliott's portfolio manager and a member of AC Milan's board of directors has granted an interview to those at Forbes and said the following:
On Elliott's ownership of AC Milan:
"It was a kind of coincidence: we lent money for the first time in the context of the transfer of ownership from the Berlusconi family, at the head of the club for 30 years with excellent results, to Chinese gentlemen. Then there were financial difficulties. We intervened to keep the club alive and out of bankruptcy. Elliott has now been the owner of AC Milan for 4 years."
On the project:
"AC Milan for many years failed to reach the Champions League, which is the tournament in which everyone wants to play in which also serves to develop the brand. Consequently, we had to adjust this situation, obtaining an improvement in performance and reducing costs. These two aspects generally do not go together. We started developing the business plan with AC Milan, modifying the management team and the business area staff, hiring some members and then various highly talented executives from the world of football. Today we want to build a new stadium with Inter. San Siro is a stadium of great memories for the Milan fans, including myself; we are working on a project to have a new stadium", declared Giorgio Furlani.
At what point is the stadium project right now?
"In Italy, various clubs have difficulty in getting the stadium project off the ground; it is very important for the growth of a team to have a modern stadium. However, there is the bureaucracy that has created so many problems for us. I was hoping for a progressive, modern and forward-looking city like Milan, where the approval process would have been simpler, but it was rather complicated. We still pushed the project forward. Frankly I hoped that today the project was almost completed, but it is not. We will continue to push and we hope to give the Milan fans what they deserve, that is, a real model stadium in which their club plays."
Credit: nuovostadiomilano.com
Giorgio Furlani on AC Milan's massive following around the world:
"Milan has always had a lot of fans, it's a fantastic brand that has fans all over the world who really care about the team. In recent years it has been a bit 'dormant' due to performances below the usual level on a sporting level that are not they allowed him to play in the top European competition; there was disappointment ... This happens if you want results, but you don't have a business plan and people who are able to sell and grow the brand; so you don't go anywhere There was, therefore, a real need to improve performance to re-ignite the passion for Milan, but it had to be done with proper management on the commercial to be able to be a strong brand again once sports performance was starting to improve. You need a combination of both."
What is the secret of Elliott's AC Milan's growth?
"You can have a period in which you lose money because you don't qualify for European competitions and that comes from national championships that didn't end well; and yes, you can find yourself in a kind of bad vicious circle, but the opposite is also true. The trick is to win or at least have a certain degree of success, but not at all costs. Milan, historically speaking, belongs to the same group as Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich, etc. Milan is among the big names in continental Europe, but as a club it comes from 8 years of difficulty in which it has lost in relevance. Now we are starting to close that gap. Now Milan are growing and are on a trajectory to catch up with those Club and look, I could argue that yes the past was difficult, like I said, but the future is very interesting and fun", said the portfoli manager of Elliott Management Corporation.
