Austrian tycoon Hans Peter Haselsteiner has come to the rescue of home-improvements millionaire Karlheinz Essl by buying a modern art collection that Essl had tried in vain to sell to the state to prop up his BauMax business empire.

A spokeswoman for Haselsteiner, whose family foundation has a 25 percent stake in construction group Strabag, confirmed a report in newspaper Die Presse on Tuesday that the Essl collection had been bought.

A new firm owned 60 percent by the Haselsteiner family foundation and 40 percent by Essl family vehicles is paying more than 100 million euros ($131 million) for the collection, the paper said. The money would help shore up the BauMax group.