Engineering Alumnus to buy St. Louis Rams

Engineering at Illinois alumnus Shahid Khan, (BS 1971, Industrial Engineering) has entered into a signed agreement to purchase majority ownership of the St. Louis Rams. Khan is president of Flex-N-Gate Corp., an auto-parts manufacturer based in Urbana, Ill.

As reported by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Khan will purchase the 60% of the team owned by siblings Chip Rosenbloom and Lucia Rodriguez, who inherited the franchise from their late mother, Georgia Frontiere, in early 2008. NFL owners must approve the sale between the Rams’ owners and Khan which is slated to close on the deal next month.

According to the Post-Dispatch article, Khan was described by league sources “as an enthusiastic Rams fan who has attended home games at the Edward Jones Dome.” They also stated that he is committed to keeping the team in St. Louis.

A native of Pakistan, Shahid Khan came to the United States at the age of 16 to attend the University of Illinois. As a student, he began working at Flex-N-Gate, an Urbana-based company that manufactured flexible roll-up gates for pickup trucks. By 1975, he was chief engineer for the company, a position he held until 1978. 

At the age of 27, Khan left Flex-N-Gate to start his own firm, Bumper Works, a company that produced an innovative one-piece metal truck bumper design that eliminated welds that had the tendency to rust. The design is now considered the industry standard. When Khan acquired Flex-N-Gate in 1980, Bumper Works became its Danville (Ill.) branch.

A creative and entrepreneurial leader, he has built Flex-N-Gate into an international manufacturing presence. Its clients include BMW, DaimlerChrysler, Ford and GM. The company has also expanded its global presence since 2000, and now has 48 manufacturing plants employing 9,500 people in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, Spain, and the United States. Flex-N-Gate’s products include: large body and chassis structural assemblies; full bumper and fascia systems, brackets, receiver hitches; interior plastic panels and pillars; exterior trim components, running board systems; scissor and screw jacks, tools, spare tire hoists, hinges, checks, pedals, parking brakes, and latch systems. Along with its subsidiary businesses, the company’s annual sales exceed $2 billion annually.

Khan’s entrepreneurial spirit also led him to a new venture in 2001, when he co-founded Smart Structures LLC, located in Rantoul, Illinois. The company has been advancing the technology of bridge monitoring, also known as structural health monitoring (SHM). These systems consist of integrated and unique devices with associated technology that analyze data obtained from “smart” bridge management systems. In addition to identifying potential structural deficiencies, the analysis points to ways to reduce the costs and inconvenience involved in bridge maintenance, repair and rehabilitation while improving safety. 

Khan received the Distinguished Alumnus Award from the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering in 1999, and the College of Engineering’s Alumni Award for Distinguished Service in 2006. He has served on multiple boards at Illinois, and currently is an active member of the College of Engineering Board of Visitors.

Editor's note: Shahid Khan is not the first engineering alumnus to own an NFL team. Chicago Bears patriarch George Halas earned a degree in civil engineering at Illinois while playing football and leading the university to the 1918 Big Ten title. After graduation, he was hired by the A.E. Staley company in Decatur to organize a company football team. Halas was both player and coach for the Decatur Staleys, part of The American Professional Football Association. The team moved to Chicago, and, at Halas' suggestion, became the "Bears" and a meeting in Canton resulted in the formation of the National Football League.
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