For those who lived through the 1980s, the names of many of the corporate cowboys of the time – Robert Holmes à Court, Laurie Connell, Christopher Skase and Kevin Parry to name a few – are etched on their memories, but the one that everyone recognises is that of Alan Bond.

Bond was a signwriter from Perth with a front and ego so immense, not to mention an astonishing ability to completely ignore all the rules, that he rose from those humble beginnings and a minimal education, to the top of a corporate leviathan – his own creation, Bond Corporation.