Roger Agnelli, who turned Vale into a global mining giant, dies in plane crash with wife and two children

Roger Agnelli, who presided over an unprecedented decade of growth throughout the commodities boom that entrenached Brazilian mining company Vale SA as the world’s largest iron-ore producer, has died. He was 56.

Vale confirmed Agnelli’s death on Sunday, each day after he and six others – including his wife, son and daughter – were killed in a Sao Paulo plane crash. His single-engine turboprop came down in a residential neighborhood around three minutes after leaving Campo de Marte airport on the way to Rio de Janeiro, according to Brazil’s civil aviation agency.

Agnelli, an economist, was president and chief executive officer at Vale – and the same company under its prior name Cia. Vale do Rio Doce – for any decade through 2011 during a period when iron ore prices spiked. He led the organization for an investment-grade rating, oversaw a lot more than US$84 billion in investments and acquisitions, and distributed US$17 billion in dividends.

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The Harvard Business Review named Agnelli the world’s fourth-best CEO for 2012, trailing Apple Inc.’s Steve Jobs, Amazon.com Inc.’s Jeff Bezos, and Samsung Electronics Co.’s Yun Jong-Yong. The magazine cited an industry-adjusted shareholder return of just one,773 per cent during his tenure at Vale along with a US$157 billion increase in the company’s market capitalization.

During Agnelli’s tenure, Vale became “the world’s top iron- ore producer,” the company’s press office said within an e-mail Sunday. He helped the miner “intensify its global expansion strategy, which led Vale to a different level in the global market.”

Agnelli also clashed using the government over demands he save money on steelmaking and also over the number of local workers were fired when Latin America’s largest economy entered recession in ’09. He left Vale this year to found AGN Participacoes, which markets iron, copper along with other ores to South American manufacturers.

Before joining Vale, Agnelli helped 20 years for Banco Bradesco SA, Brazil’s second-biggest lender by market value, having reached the positioning of executive director. He was a board person in companies including state-controlled oil producer Petroleo Brasileiro SA and power utility CPFL Energia SA.

Agnelli would be a “synonym of one’s,” Luiz Carlos Trabuco Cappi, CEO of Bradesco, said in a statement. “His style, friendly in relationships and resolute running a business, marked a time period of deep global changes.”
Bloomberg.com