25 Most Successful Entrepreneurs of the 21st Century

25. Forrest Mars, Jr., Net Worth – $24.5 Billion. Founded by Frank, Forrest’s grandfather, the company started producing chocolate in Tacoma, Wash, the year 1911. Today, with John and Jacqueline (his siblings) he owns the most powerful candy maker company – Mars.

Besides producing candy, the company is also responsible for producing Uncle Ben’s rice and food for pets – Whiskas and Pedigree.

24. George Soros, Net Worth – $24.9 Billion. Through the Soros Fund Management firm he acquired his present-day wealth. After escaping Hungary, Soros had graduated from the London School of Economics.

He also had worked as a railway porter and a waiter, before he transferred to a merchant bank. As a big philanthropist, he donated more than $11 million during his lifetime through Open Society Foundations.

23. Phil Knight, Net Worth – $25.3 Billion. Founder of one of the most recognized shoe companies in the world – Nike. He received his MBA at Stanford, after which he decided to travel the world.

Knight and his old coach, Bill Bowerman, began their business journey with Nike’s preceding version, Blue Ribbon Sports. In June 2015, he stepped down as chairman, and most of his shares went into Swoosh, LLC.

22. Beate Heister & Karl Albrecht Jr., Net Worth – $27.3 Billion. They are the descendants of Karl Albrecht Sr. – a person who inherited a grocery store in Essen, Germany.

Karl and his brother Theo used a low-price strategy (similarly to Wal-Mart) to expand their business.

21. Sheldon Adelson, Net Worth – $28.1 Billion. Thanks to his company, the biggest casino in the U.S. – Las Vegas Sands, Adelson makes billions, which he uses to make an impact in the Republican Party. By the way, the author of this article wrote also for the subsection devoted to real money slots here on SlotoZilla web source.

He started off really poor, selling newspaper ads in his newspaper corner by the age of 12. His business steadily grew, as he finally invested $1.5 billion in a hotel in 1995.

20. Jorge Paulo Lemann, Net Worth – $28.8 Billion. Lemann and his two longstanding partners – Marcel Herrmann Telles and Carlos Sicupira, own a stake in Anheuser-Busch InBev, which is one of their most profitable properties.

Alongside the world’s largest brewer, the above-mentioned trio also holds stakes in Restaurant Brands International (Burger King being one of them).

19. Wang Jianlin, Net Worth – $29.7 Billion. Wang started off building shopping plazas and hotels as a real estate developer.

Today he owns a real estate company (Wanda Commercial Properties) and Chinese movie theater chain (Wanda Cinema Line). In 2016, he is planning to invest an astounding $3.5 billion into Legendary Entertainment.

18. Li Ka Shing, Net Worth – $30.4 Billion. Shing is one of the most powerful tycoons in Asia, and the wealthiest person in Hong Kong.

His business spans a wide range – from utilities, telecom and ports to retail and real estate. This all-rounder employed approximately 290.000 people in his companies.

17. S. Robson Walton, Net Worth – $32.6 Billion. After the death of his father, Sam Walton (1992), Rob spent 23 years managing their retail kingdom, until he finally decided to step down as chairman in 2015.

After stepping down, he kept his position on the board with Jim – his younger brother.

16. Alice Walton, Net Worth – $33 Billion. Alice’s wealth originates from her father Sam – founder of Wal-Mart. Unlike her brothers, Jim and Rob, Alice didn’t partake in the orchestration of their retail giant legacy.

Instead, she invested herself and her fortune into art. She reached her career peak by opening Crystal Bridges Art Museum, in Bentonville, Ark.

15. Jim Walton, Net Worth – $34.3 Billion. Jim is the youngest inheritor of Sam Walton’s Wal-Mart legacy. He is a member of the board which administers over 11.000 stores worldwide with $486 billion in sales.

Along Wal-Mart, Jim is likewise chairman and CEO of the Arvest Bank with assets of approximately $16 billion.

14. Sergey Brin, Net Worth – $34.6 Billion. Sergey is a present-day president of Alphabet – a parent-like extension of Google, which was founded on his and Larry Page’s behalf in 2015.

Within Alphabet, multiple companies reside, such as – Youtube, Calico, Nest, Google X etc. Together with the company, they managed to surpass Apple in stock values in February 2016.

13. Larry Page, Net Worth – $35.4 Billion. Today, Page is the Chief Executive Officer at Alphabet. He co-founded Google (1998) together with his colleague, Sergey Brin, and held the position of CEO until 2001 (reclaiming it in 2011).

12. Bernard Arnault, Net Worth – $35.6 Billion. One of the most recognized “taste-makers” in the world.

He is responsible for 70 brands (involving Louis Vuitton, Sephora, Dom Perignon etc), plus approximately 3.700 retail stores. He has been fulfilling his duty as the CEO since 1989.

11. Liliane Bettencourt, Net Worth – $36.1 Billion. She is the first person of the L’Oréal, and together with her children, they own 33% of the cosmetics kingdom – founded by her father, Eugene Schueller, in 1907. Liliane is proclaimed as the wealthiest woman in Europe.

10. Michael Bloomberg, Net Worth – $41.7 Billion. In the past year, Bloomberg has been trying to revitalize the financial data and media company of his empire.

Besides that, he is being active on the political scene and it is still debated if he is about to enter the election as an independent candidate.

8. David Koch, Net Worth – $42.4 Billion. David and his older brother Charles are in charge of Koch Industries that counts over $115 billion in sales.

Koch Industries operate with refineries, oil pipelines, paper towels, building materials etc. Beside entrepreneur, he’s involved in politics, together with his brother (they raised almost $900 million for certain social issues.

They are also active philanthropists. The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has the David H. Koch Plaza, part of a $65 million renovation he funded, and the David Koch Charitable Foundation has made more than $1.2 billion in contributions over his lifetime.

8. Charles Koch, Net Worth – $42.4 Billion. Charles has been chairman of the Koch Industries since 1967. The company started off with the worth of $50 million, and today, it is the second most powerful private firm in the U.S (value over $100 billion).

Charles and David are likewise active philanthropists – over their lifetime, they donated more than $1.2 billion.

7. Mark Zuckerberg, Net Worth – $45.9 Billion. The co-founder and CEO of Facebook. With only 19 years of age, he dropped out of Harvard and founded the social network, which brought him billions of dollars, and the stock value is still on the rise (he gained $11.2 billion in only 12 months!).

Together with his wife, they declared that they would donate 99% of their stock at the Facebook company.

6. Larry Ellison, Net Worth – $47 Billion. Ellison stepped down as the CEO of Oracle in 2014, but as chairman, he still partakes in decision-making. The official website of the Oracle company is here.

The company was founded in 1977 and the main aim of the firm was and still is, customer relationship management databases.

5. Jeff Bezos, Net Worth – $49.4 Billion. CEO and founder of Amazon. The company brought him over $100 billion in revenue, in 2015.

Along Amazon, he is also the CEO of Blue Origin which is an aerospace company.

4. Carlos Slim Helu, Net Worth – $57.9 Billion. Carlos was announced as the richest man in 2015 thanks to the mobile phone operator – America Movil. Although he suffered a $27.1 billion drop in 2016, he is still among the wealthiest.

Carlos owns approximately 17% of the shares, which makes him the largest shareholder of that company.

3. Warren Buffett, Net Worth – $65.2 Billion. CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. in 2015, his company concurred in giving $37 billion to Precision Castparts for aerospace and industrial parts maker. Warren is one of Hillary Clinton’s main advocates.

2. Amancio Ortega, Net Worth – $70.9 Billion. Crowned as the wealthiest retailer worldwide and the richest entrepreneur in Europe.

The Zara founder started off in a company that operated in the textile industry, back in 1963, after which he cofounded Zara with Rosalia Mera (his ex-wife) in 1975.

1. Bill Gates, Net Worth – $76.7 Billion. With tiny oscillations, he has been at the top for a long time. Once CEO of Microsoft, today the main orchestrator (together with his wife, Melinda) of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.