Unsurprisingly, former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates and former Oracle CEO Larry Ellison top the list of the richest people in technology, but did you know that Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is in third place after a recent surge in the value of the online retailer’s shares?
Forbes magazine has published its first ever list of the 100 richest people in technology, and the list contains a few surprises.
More than half of those on the list are from the US, showing that country is still the global hotbed of innovation in the technology industry.
Remarkably, 40% of those on the list live in California.
Asia is growing fast, though, with 33% of the billionaires on the list hailing from that continent, Forbes said.
To make the list, the richest 100 had to have a minimum net worth of US$2bn. Forbes said eight people from Europe are counted among the top 100, along with two from the Middle East and one from Latin America. No one from Africa made the cut.
Gates tops the list with a net worth of $79,6bn, although less than 13% of his estimated fortune now comes from Microsoft shares, Forbes said.
Second-placed Ellison’s net worth is estimated at $50bn, while Bezos, ranked third, is worth an estimated $47,8bn.
Others in the top 10, in order, are Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), Larry Page (Google), Sergey Brin (Google), Jack Ma (Alibaba), Steve Ballmer (ex-Microsoft), Laurene Powell Jobs (Steve Jobs’s widow) and Michael Dell (Dell). — (c) 2015 NewsCentral Media