A Neapolitan businessman once known as 'The Grain King' was found beaten to death together with his wife in the exclusive Naples district of Posillipo on Wednesday.

Police said Franco Ambrosio and his wife, Giovanna Sacco, were apparently taken by surprise by two or more people who bludgeoned them with a steel rod or something similar.

He was discovered in a pool of blood in the kitchen while she was in a study. Both were in their night clothes.

Investigators believe that the couple may have been killed during a nighttime burglary and there are unconfirmed reports that the probe is focusing on gangs of Albanians and Romanians specialised in robbing villas in the Naples areas.

The Ambrosios' bayside villa was said to have been ransacked and a broken terrace window was found which may have been the point of entry.

The intruders apparently left ample evidence behind including fingerprints and biological traces which could contain their DNA, police said.

Ambrosio, 77, was once the owner of Italgrani, a grain company which at its height had a turnover of some 1.2 billion euros.

His industrial empire began to crumble after he was arrested in 1994 on allegations of defrauding the European Union of some $32 million of subsidies for a phantom export shipment of durum-wheat bran to Algeria.

The following year he was back in the national spotlight after being arrested for allegedly collecting kickbacks on behalf of his friend Paolo Cirino Pomicino, a former Christian Democrat budget minister and fellow Neapolitan.

''I'm shocked by such an act of violence against two elderly people, two great people,'' Cirino Pomicino said after hearing of the murders.

''We were friends for over 20 years. He was a great businessman who created a multinational here in the south. And he always had a special place in his heart for his friends,'' the former minister added.

Ambrosio's involvement in the Clean Hands political corruption scandal set the stage for the end of his business empire which stretched to Africa, Australia, Russia and the United States.

The multinational collapsed in 1999 and Ambrosio was later convicted of fraudulent bankruptcy.