Agnelli

"It's Antoine Bernheim, a legendary figure in Lazard Bank, with his unwavering three-piece suit even in the heatwave, and mentor to Vincent Bolloré in his early years, who inoculated the green-white-red virus into the entrepreneur. And by the way, the first dose was served on a silver platter by the Italians themselves: "I know a very intelligent boy, I am a friend of the family, and he needs help," Bernheim confided to the Agnelli, the owners of Fiat, for whom he was, at Lazard, the gateway to France."

"On March 12th he was driving in the Verona-Mantua event of one hundred miles. Eighteen tricars took part, and Ettore Bugatti won on a Prinetti tricar fitted with a De Dion-Bouton engine. Count Biscaretti was second, and Fraschini third. In the motor-car class, victory went to Agnelli, driving a Fiat."

"he became the historic mentor of industrialists Bernard Arnault and Vincent Bolloré, and to a lesser extent the advisor of François Pinault, as well as Nicolas Sarkozy, at least in his early years. He also counts among his European "protégés": Italian John Elkann, the heir to the Agnelli dynasty, or banker Gerardo Braggiotti, also a former Lazard associate."

"Antoine Bernheim shakes his head with a gloomy expression. He hardly appreciated that two of his candidates, young John Philip Elkann, heir to the Agnelli family, and Franco-Polish financier Romain Zaleski, were rejected from the board of directors of the Lion of Trieste, the third largest European insurance company founded in 1831. Two of his dearest relationships, on which he relied heavily to alleviate the boredom of long-winded advice. Because Antoine Bernheim, son of Léonce Bernheim and Renée-Marcelle Schwob d'Héricourt, detests two things: monotony and mediocrity."