Kraken Opus

The company is owned by Karl Fowler, a former Goldman Sachs investment banker. He founded Kraken Opus following a period managing his own financial services company, for which he built up a client list including several sports stars. The interests of these clients inspired him to consider a high-end publication for sports fans; he invested $5 million of his own money and of capital put up by friends and acquaintances to found Kraken Opus. Its first title was the Manchester United Opus, published in 2006: the book weighed 97 pounds (44 kg) and each edition in its 10,000 run was priced between £3000 and £4500.

In December 2008 the company opened a proprietary shop in Covent Garden. The company entered voluntary administration in June 2009 when a US backer announced that a tranche of $6m in promised funding would not be forthcoming. Days later, following an offer to existing shareholders, Fowler and partner Paul Murphy undertook a management buyout of the company, announcing that a new Arab funder had been found and that the company's headquarters would be moved from London to the United Arab Emirates. At the time the company faced criticism over the delayed publication of the £3000-per-copy Celtic Opus, which was postponed from July 2009, after pre-orders and deposits had been received. The print run was also reduced, but the firm insisted that publication would still go ahead.