A person familiar with the search operation reported that British tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch was missing on Monday after his luxury yacht was hit by a violent thunderstorm and sank near the Sicilian capital Palermo.

Lynch, 59 years old, was found not guilty of fraud in June 2011 by a San Francisco jury. The charges were related to the sale of Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard, for $11 billion.

Lynch was hailed as Britain's Bill Gates. However, Hewlett-Packard slashed the value of Autonomy by $8.8 Billion.

Lynch was "elated", he said, to have been cleared of any criminal charges in the criminal trial. He took the stand to defend himself, and denied to the jurors that he had done anything wrong.

(source: Reuters)