People have gained notoriety by accomplishing something that inspires amazement in the rest of the world. From the creation of the world’s first microcomputer through the establishment of a space research agency dedicated to the launch of numerous ships.
From political decisions to social and economic transformations, billionaires play a critical role in influencing the world. We’ve compiled a list of the world’s top 20 billionaires, who have risen to the top through extraordinary achievements.
Elon Musk
Jeff Bezos
Bernard Arnault
Bill Gates
Larry Page
Warren Buffett
Sergey Brin
Steve Ballmer
Larry Ellison
Mukesh Ambani
Gautam Adani
Mark Zuckerberg
Francoise Bettencourt Meyers
Changpeng Zhao
Zhong Shanshan
Carlos Slim
Jim Walton
Amancio Ortega
Rob Walton
Charles Koch
Elon Musk
Net Worth- $235 billion
Industry- Technology
Country- United States
As we all know, from being the founder of SpaceX to becoming the CEO of Tesla and also owns many titles such as the founder of Neuralink, OpenAI, and The Boring Company. Elon Musk is a force to be reckoned with in the world of technology, which ultimately made him the world’s richest person as of now with a net worth of $235 Billion.
Elon Musk began his career in 1995 when he and his brother Kimbal Musk founded Zip2, a web software company that did not succeed and went out of business in 1999.
Elon Musk founded X.com, an online financial services platform that merged with PayPal, with Musk owning 11.7 per cent of the company’s stock.
Musk’s life took a turn in 2001 when he started SpaceX with the goal of decreasing space transportation costs. SpaceX deployed roughly 34 satellites in 2021 and plans to launch 52 more by 2022.
After that, in 2004, Elon Musk became Chairman of Tesla by investing a majority stake in the company with the intention of producing electric vehicles. When questioned about his development of Tesla-electric cars, he refused to give up and backed up his assertion that electric cars are both efficient and conventional, resulting in Tesla scoring the largest market in the automobile business by 2021.
Jeff Bezos
Net Worth- $181 billion
Industry- Technology
Country- United States
Almost half of the population has made a purchase from Amazon, the world’s largest online marketplace, which sells everything from A to Z and was founded by Jeff Bezos. Bezos founded Amazon in 1994 as an online bookshop, subsequently expanding to other consumer goods.
During the 2000s, he experienced financial ups and downs, and in 2016, the firm raised approximately $671 million, which is the greatest sum ever raised in Amazon shares. According to Forbes, Jeff Bezos surpassed Bill Gates as the world’s wealthiest person in 2017.
Moreover, Bezos is the founder and CEO of The Washington Post, an American newspaper publishing firm, and Blue Origin, aerospace, and spaceflight manufacturing company, in addition to being the founder and CEO of Amazon. With a net worth of $181 billion as of February 2022, Jeff Bezos is the second richest person on the planet.
Bernard Arnault
Net Worth- $161 billion
Industry- Consumer
Country- France
When we think of “global fashion,” the first words that come to mind are Paris or LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton. Bernard Arnault founded Louis Vuitton, the world’s most recognizable luxury goods fashion brand, in 1987. Initially, Arnault and his managerial partner, Antoine Bernheim, invested together in Boussac Saint-Frères, a subsidiary of Christian Dior.
In 1987, Bernard was encouraged to invest via Joint Venture with Guinness PLC by former LVMH chairman Henri Racamier. Bernard later founded the world’s largest duty-free chain in the 1990s, which included Sephora, Loewe, Celine, Berluti, Christain Lacroix, and other well-known fashion labels.
Bernard also extended his business in the 2000s by acquiring premium labels such as La Samaritaine, Fendi, Bulgari, and Tiffany & Co. Bernard has earned the title of “Europe’s wealthiest person,” with a net worth of approximately $161 billion.
Bill Gates
Net Worth- $128 billion
Industry- Technology
Country- United States
With the exception of 2010, 2011, 2012, and 2013, the world-famous billionaire, investor, author, philanthropist, and co-founder of Microsoft has appeared on the list of the world’s wealthiest people every year since 1987.
Bill Gates was a key figure in the microcomputer revolution in the 1970s and 1980s. Gates enrolled in his first software program when he was very young, and he was particularly interested in programming the General Electric system in BASIC.
In 1970, four students were grouped -Bill Gates, Paul Allen, Kent Evans, and Ric Wieland & created the ‘Lakeside Programming’ club to make money. In 1975, Gates founded ‘Microsoft’ with his friend Paul, and produced the first-of-its-kind programming language BASIC for the Altair 8800 ‘Microcomputer,’ an early personal computer.
Following the merger with IBM, Gates released the first retail version of Microsoft Windows in 1985, making him the richest person on the planet with $128 billion in February 2022.
Larry Page
Net Worth- $121 billion
Industry- Technology
Country- United States
He is the co-founder of Google and a computer scientist and Internet entrepreneur from the United States. In 1998, Page and his friend Sergey Brin teamed up to create the domain name ‘Google.’
With one billion URLs at the time, Google became the most searched web in 2000. After hiring Sundar Pichai into the Google team as CEO and Eric Emerson Schmidt in 2011, he withdrew from Google.
Larry Page also founded Google’s parent firm, Alphabet, the world’s largest search engine operator, from which he stepped down in 2019 but remained a board director. Larry Page’s net worth is predicted to be 121 billion dollars, putting him in fifth place on the list of the world’s wealthiest individuals as of February 2022.
Warren Buffett
Net Worth- $115 billion
Industry- Technology
Country- Diversified
Warren Buffett became the richest man in the world as a result of his partnerships with major corporations such as Apple Inc., Coca-Cola, Bank of America, Kraft Heinz, BYD, DaVita, and others. He is recognized as the ‘Oracle of Omaha,’ as a successful investor in both the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.
Buffett’s primary investment was a large interest in the textile producer Berkshire Hathaway Inc. in 1965, which proved to be a huge shot in his career. He is currently holding the sixth richest person in the world as per Bloomberg Billionaires Index, worth 115 billion dollars.
Sergey Brin
Net Worth- $116 billion
Industry- Technology
Country- United States
As I stated above, Sergey Brin, a Google partner as well as the co-founder, assisted Larry Page in the development of the world’s first online search engine internet- Google. Brin followed Page’s lead and stepped down as CEO of Google and Alphabet.
Brin was a Stanford student when he met Page and developed the PageRank Algorithm, which led to the creation of Google, a California-based firm founded in 1998. Sergey Brin is the 7th most powerful person on the list of the world’s richest people, with a fortune of $115 billion, as of February 2022.
Steve Ballmer
Net Worth- $108 billion
Industry- Technology
Country- United States
He is a businessman and investor from the United States who served as the CEO of Microsoft for 14 years, from 2000 to 2014. Bill Gates hired Steve Ballmer as his first business manager in June 1980, offering him 5 to 10% of the company’s stock.
After antitrust litigation against competing corporations, Steve Ballmer was given the post of CEO of Microsoft in 2000. Steve was interested in sports and had planned to invest in the Seattle SuperSonics, but instead moved to Oklahoma City and began playing for them. Ballmer invested approximately $650 million after Chris R. Hansen proposed bringing the Seattle SuperSonics back.
Later that year, there was an auction for the Los Angeles Clippers, in which Steve Ballmer was the biggest bidder in sports history, winning $2 billion. In February 2022, Steve Ballmer’s net worth was estimated to be $108 billion.
Ria Puneyani
Larry Ellison
Net Worth- $98.8 billion
Industry- Technology
Country- United States
Oracle Corporation, a Texas-based firm founded by Larry Ellison in 1977, is the world’s second-largest software company. Larry and Bob Miner worked at Ampex Corporations on a similar version of Edgar Ted Codd’s remarkable work on IBM’s ‘rational database,’ which led to the establishment of Oracle Corp. The ‘Structured Query Language (SQL)’ was Oracle’s initial database application, and it immediately became popular.
The program’s first customer was the United States Air Force, who employed it at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. In 2021, he became an exclusive member of Oracle Corporation after purchasing 40% of the company’s stock. He is also the world’s ninth richest person with the asset 97.7 billion dollars, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index for February 2022.
Mukesh Ambani
Net Worth- $91.1 billion
Industry- Energy
Country- India
For long-standing, Ambani is the first richest Asian in the world according to the Bloomberg Index. He is the owner of Reliance industries limited, which is considered the most valuable brand on the Fortune Global 500 list. Ambani took his late father Dhirubhai Ambani’s steps in developing RIL and its expansion in the field of petrochemicals, natural gas, mass media, textiles, and telecommunications.
Reliance Industries Ltd. is the largest retailer in India and held the title of India’s richest person on Forbes list for the past 10 years. In 2018, Ambani became the richest Asian over Jack Ma– CEO of Alibaba Group with 44.3 billion dollars as net worth. As of now, Mukesh Ambani’s net worth is $91 Billion.
Gautam Adani
Net Worth- $85.2 billion
Industry- Industrial
Country- India
Gautam Adani is an Indian industrialist and philanthropist worth billions of dollars. He is the creator and chairman of the Adani Group, a transnational firm founded in Ahmedabad that works in port advancement and projects in India. Adani also administers as the president of the Adani Foundation, which is governed by his wife, Priti Adani.
Adani was born on June 24, 1962, in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, to Shantilal and Shanti Adani and has 7 siblings. His father worked for a modest textile company. Adani was interested in business, but not in his father’s textile company. In 1978, Adani began his work as a diamond sorter for Mahendra Brothers, and in 1981, he took over as the manager of his brother’s plastics project.
He began importing primary polymers for small-scale manufacturers in 1985, and by the early 1990s, he had expanded his firm to include metals, textiles, and agricultural items.
Adani joined the power generation business in 2006. Adani won the world’s largest solar bid, worth $6 billion, from the Solar Energy Corporation of India in May 2020. Adani purchased a 74% share in Mumbai International Airport, India’s next busiest airport, in September 2020. And after continuously accomplishing his enterprise, he ultimately came to be Asia’s richest person in February 2022.
Mark Zuckerberg
Net Worth- $83.6 billion
Industry- Technology
Country- United States
One of the most extensively utilised social media networks is Facebook. Mark Zuckerberg is the co-founder of Facebook as well as the chairman of Meta, the business that owns Facebook. Zuckerberg was born on 14 May 1984 in White Plains, New York, United States. Zuckerberg was studying at Harvard University. In February 2004, Zuckerberg and his Harvard University roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Moskovitz, and Chris Hughes created Facebook from their dorm room.
Initially limited to a few college campuses, the site quickly grew in popularity and finally surpassed one billion users by 2012. In May 2012, Zuckerberg took the firm public with a controlling stake. He came to be the world’s youngest self-made billionaire at the age of 23 in 2007.
Since 2008, Time magazine has labelled Zuckerberg as one of the world’s 100 most influential people as part of its Person of the Year award, which he won in 2010.
Zuckerberg was positioned 10th on Forbes’ list of the World’s Most Powerful People in December 2016. According to the Forbes Real-Time Billionaires Index, Zuckerberg’s net worth was $83.6 billion on February 4, 2022, and his net worth went low by $29.7 billion due to a drop in Meta Platforms shares, which caused the social media giant to lose roughly a fourth of its market price.
Francoise Bettencourt Meyers
Net Worth- $81.2 billion
Industry- Consumer
Country- France
We read about many wealthy guys in the previous sections, and now it’s time to meet Francoise Bettencourt Meyers, the world’s wealthiest woman. Françoise Bettencourt Meyers is a rich inheritor from France. She was born in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, on July 10, 1953. L’Oreal was founded by her grandfather, Eugène Schueller.
Bettencourt Meyers’ net worth was over $39.5 billion in 2017, putting her among the top 20 wealthiest persons on the planet. Even though Francoise Bettencourt Meyers had a 33% interest in L’Oreal, Françoise devotes her time to writing novels.
The heiress is a writer who has written books on everything from Greek mythology to the Bible. She was raised Catholic and is academic. She even co-founded the Bettencourt Schueller Foundation with her mother in 1987 to assist scientific, artistic, and humanitarian studies.
According to the aforementioned Vanity Fair profile, she favoured playing the piano or reading books even as a child. According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, she was the world’s richest woman in January 2022, with a net worth of $81.2 billion.
Ashwini
Changpeng Zhao
Net Worth- $79.1 billion
Industry- Finance
Country- Canada
Binance is one of the world’s major cryptocurrency exchanges and it was created by Changpeng Zhao, also known as CZ. He is the founder and CEO of Binance. Changpeng Zhao was born in Jiangsu, China, on September 10, 1977. He was raised in Canada, where he completed his education.
CZ began working when he was a teenager in order to assist his parents. In the 1980s, he worked at McDonald’s. He later studied Computer Science at McGill University. He was also interested in stock markets and trading, which influenced his decision to pursue this profession. Zhao worked as the chief technology officer of OKCoin and was a part of the Blockchain.info development team.
As of January 23, 2022, his net worth was computed to be $96 billion, propelling him the wealthiest person in Canada and he has earned the 14th stance in the chart of richest persons on the planet, according to Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
Zhong Shanshan
Net Worth- $75.8 billion
Industry- Diversified
Country- China
Zhong Shanshan is a rich Chinese businessman. He is the majority owner of Beijing Wantai Biological Pharmacy Enterprise and the creator and chairman of the Nongfu Spring beverage firm.
Zhong was born in the Chinese city of Hangzhou in 1954. In 1977, he began his career as a journalist at the Zhejiang Daily and then moved into the business world. After relocating to Hainan, he worked as a sales representative for the Wahaha beverage company, where he marketed healthcare supplements.
Zhong established a bottled water firm in Hangzhou in 1996, named Nongfu Spring. His company grew prosperous as a result of his hard effort. He was the sixth wealthiest person in the world in 2021, with a net worth of 95 billion dollars, but he plummeted after suffering a significant loss. He owned 84.4 per cent of Nongfu Spring and was the company’s chairperson as of January 2021.
Carlos Slim
Net Worth- $69.5 billion
Industry- Diversified
Country- Mexico
Carlos Slim Hel is a philanthropist, investor, and telecommunications billionaire from Mexico. Slim was born in Mexico City on January 28, 1940. He had an interest in business since he was a child.
He began investing in government savings bonds when he was 11 years old, and at the age of 12, he bought shares in a Mexican bank, eventually becoming the largest shareholder in the country. In civil engineering, he received his diploma.
Education, health care, industrial manufacturing, transportation, real estate, media, energy, hospitality, entertainment, high-tech, retail, sports, and financial services are among the industries represented in his alliance.
His net worth is equal to around 6% of Mexico’s gross domestic product, and he controls 40% of the Mexican Stock Exchange’s listings. He is the richest person in Latin America. With a net worth of $69.5 billion as of January 2022, Bloomberg Billionaires Index rated him as the world’s 16th richest person.
Jim Walton
Net Worth- $61.5 billion
Industry- Retail
Country- United States
James Carr Walton, an American businessman and the heir to Walmart’s riches, is the world’s biggest merchandiser. Jim Walton was born in the Arkansas town of Newport, in the county of Jackson. Walton earned a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration in Marketing from the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville, Arkansas, in 1971, after graduating from Bentonville High School in 1965.
He joined Walmart in 1972 and worked in the company’s real estate division. In 1975, he became president of Walton Enterprises, a family business, after serving for four years. He was CEO of his family’s Arvest Bank before becoming Chairman of Arvest Bank and Chairman of Jim Walton’s newspaper company, Community Publishers Inc. (CPI). Walton was noted to possess more than 152 million Walmart stakes worth more than $11 billion in September 2016.
According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Walton was the seventeenth richest person on the planet in January 2022, with a net worth of US$61.5 billion.
Amancio Ortega
Net Worth- $60.5 billion
Industry- Retail
Country- Spain
Amancio Ortega Gaona is a Spanish billionaire businessman. He is the founder and former chairman of Inditex fashion group, best known for its chain of Zara clothing and accessories shops. He was born on 28 March 1936 in Busdongo de Arbas, Spain. At the age of 14, he relocated to A Coruna. He worked for Gala, a local shirtmaker, while he was a teenager.
He started Confecciones Goa in 1972 to offer quilted bathrobes. With his wife Rosala Mera, he launched the first Zara store in 1975. Ortega declared his impending retirement from Inditex, the parent company of the Zara clothing retailer, in 2011. Ortega has a net worth of $60.5 billion making him the world’s 19th wealthiest person.
Rob Walton
Net Worth- $61.1 billion
Industry- Retail
Country- United States
Samuel Robson Walton, the world’s richest man, is the heir to Walmart’s fortune. Rob Walton was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on October 28, 1944. Walton studied at The College of Wooster and earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from the University of Arkansas in 1966. In 1969, he graduated from Columbia Law School with a Juris doctorate.
Walton joined the firm as a member after graduating. He was the senior vice president of Walmart in 1978 and was promoted to vice chairman in 1982. From 1992 through 2015, he was the chairman of Walmart.
Charles Koch
Net Worth- $59.2 billion
Industry- Industrial
Country- United States
Charles de Ganahl Koch, a rich businessman from the United States, inherited from his father. He was born in Wichita, Kansas, on November 1, 1935. He attended a private school and received his education at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He earned a bachelor’s degree in general engineering, a master’s degree in nuclear engineering, and a second master’s degree in chemical engineering.
Koch began working at Arthur D. Little, Inc. after graduating from college. Along with his brothers, he inherited his father’s business. He is a co-founder of the Cato Institute in Washington, D.C. On the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, he was listed as the world’s 21st richest person in January 2022, with a net worth of $59.2 billion.
Conclusion
The above-compiled list of billionaires consists of billionaires from different industries who made big in their industry. There are billionaires who gained their billionaire status by starting their own space company and some by diversifying their portfolio and smartly investing in stocks. The industry that produced the most billionaires is technology. So, if you want to know who will be the next new billionaire, keep a close watch on this industry.
FAQ
Who is the No 1 richest person in the world?
As of Feb 2022, Elon Musk is the richest person in the world with a net worth of $224 billion.
Who is the richest person in India?
Mukesh Ambani is the richest person in India with a net worth of Rs 7.18 lakh crore.
Which country has the most billionaires?
The United States has the most number of billionaires with 724 billionaires in the country.
