How Iris built the fortune
Iris Fontbona is the widow of Andrónico Luksic Abaroa, the Chilean businessman who built one of Latin America's largest family groups. After his death in 2005 she and her children inherited control of the group's assets, which are held through family trusts and holding companies. Fontbona has never been the operational head of the businesses, but she sits at the centre of the family's ownership structure.
The group grew from modest beginnings in northern Chile. Andrónico Luksic Abaroa, the son of a Croatian immigrant in Antofagasta, started with car dealerships and small investments in the region, then moved into mining and industry. In the 1980s the family took control of Antofagasta plc, a company that had begun as a railway in the nineteenth century and which it turned into a copper producer. The opening of the Los Pelambres mine in central Chile at the end of the 1990s transformed Antofagasta into one of the world's significant copper miners.
The second branch of the fortune is Quiñenco, a Santiago listed holding company that brings together the family's banking, beverage, shipping and fuel businesses. Its most important assets were assembled through acquisitions in the 1980s and 1990s, including a controlling interest in Banco de Chile in 2001. Rising copper prices and the long term growth of the Chilean economy have been the main forces behind the value of the family's holdings.
Unlike many family fortunes in the region, the Luksic holdings are split between a pure mining company quoted in London and a diversified holding company quoted in Santiago. That structure has given the family exposure both to global commodity cycles and to domestic consumer and financial businesses, which tend to behave differently over time. Family members sit on the boards of the main companies, while professional managers handle daily operations.
Companies and holdings
The Luksic family's main interests include:
- Antofagasta plc, listed in London, which operates the Los Pelambres, Centinela, Antucoya and Zaldívar copper mines in Chile and also owns a railway and water business in the Antofagasta region.
- Quiñenco, which controls Banco de Chile, the brewer and beverage company CCU, the shipping company CSAV, the fuel distributor Enex and the port and logistics group SAAM.
Through CSAV, the family is one of the largest shareholders of the German container line Hapag-Lloyd, a stake that delivered very large dividends during the shipping boom of 2021 and 2022. Fontbona's sons and stepson hold leading positions across these companies, with Andrónico Luksic Craig serving as chairman of Quiñenco and Jean-Paul Luksic long associated with Antofagasta.
Early life and career
Fontbona was born in Chile in 1942. Little has been published about her upbringing, and she has given almost no interviews during her life. She became the second wife of Andrónico Luksic Abaroa, whose first wife, Ena Craig, had died, leaving him with two sons, Andrónico and Guillermo. Fontbona and Luksic Abaroa had three children together: Jean-Paul, Paola and Gabriela.
During her husband's lifetime the family business expanded from regional investments into a national conglomerate, and the children took on senior roles as it grew. When Luksic Abaroa died in 2005, the fortune passed to Fontbona and the children. Guillermo Luksic, who had chaired Quiñenco, died in 2013, after which Andrónico Luksic Craig became the main public representative of the family's business interests.
Philanthropy and public life
Fontbona keeps an extremely private life and is rarely seen at public events. The family's charitable activity is carried out mainly through the Luksic Foundation and related initiatives, which fund education, scholarships, cultural projects and community programmes in Chile, as well as gifts to universities in Chile and abroad. Several Luksic family members have also made donations to academic institutions in the United States and Croatia.
The group's businesses have occasionally been involved in public debates in Chile, including questions about water use by mining operations and the political influence of large family conglomerates. Public statements on such matters are usually made by the companies or by Andrónico Luksic Craig rather than by Fontbona herself, who has not taken a visible role in public life.