Carmen Busquets, the hidden side of luxury business online

In Claridge’s, no one is supposed to ignore their name or their desires.When she is in London, it is in this palace in the Mayfair district that Carmen Busquets descends.And even if she has a magnificent-museum apartment in Paris decorated with works of art, she has taken up residence in large hotels around the world.

She arrives and greets warmly.His hand, adorned with jewelry, trafficking a hearing aid."I am partially deaf," she announces with her sparseness Hispanic accent.Before continuing, in the tone of confidence: "I only learned it at 20 years old and I knew that I was dyslexic about ten years ago.Before this meeting, an investor had warned: "He is a real character!"Very malignant," described a British bank analyst."Carmen is the godmother of the sale of luxury on the web, it was she who created this space," explains Chris Morton, founder of the Lyst start-up, in which she invested after having made a fortune with the net site-to wear.com.

If a horde of lawyers and business bankers are currently negotiating the merger between Net-A-Porte (ownership of the Swiss group Richemont, which bought it for around 420 million euros in 2010) and the Italian Yoox.COM (540 million euros in turnover in 2014, side on the Milan Stock Exchange), it is largely thanks to this Venezuelan business woman.A summary in the financial circles of the luxury industry.An unknown for others and the general public.For all, an enigmatic figure, powerful, single woman, childless, who sulks photographers and perfectly accommodates the virtuality of the Internet.

E-commerce pioneer

In the early 2000s in Caracas, Carmen Busquets, then 35 years old, at the head of a luxury boutique, intends to speak of an ambitious Anglo-American fashion journalist, Natalie Massenet, who struggled to bring together the necessary funds for theFoundation of an e-commerce site of a new kind.The climate is hostile.The Internet bubble has just exploded.

You have 83 left.48% of this article to read.The rest is reserved for subscribers.