1. Elon Musk



Let’s begin with the world’s second richest man Elon Reeve Musk ( in Feb, 2021 by CNBC ) , born June 28, 1971 in Pretoria, Transwaal, South Africa (according to wikipedia ). Elon was a brilliant kid from the very childhood. He developed interest in computing at the age of 10 ( sometimes geeks calls him the Iron Man of real world) , learned computer programming using a manual and created a video game, which he called Blastar based on BASIC code. He sold it for approximately $500 to the then popular magazine PC & Office Technology . Although he was bullied throughout his childhood ( like we often witness in most movies based on some brilliant people) for his awkwardness and introvert nature.

He did his schooling from Waterkloof House Preparatory School and Bryanston High School then graduated from Pretoria Boys High School . After that he studied in various Universities of United States and earned Bachelor of Science degree in Physics and Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics in 1997 .He did some odd jobs at a farm and lumber-mill while staying in Saskatchewan for a year with his cousin.

He founded his own space venture company called SpaceX and he is the early investor , CEO and product architect of Tesla Inc. which he still is.

Before he becoming one of the richest man of the world he got two internships in Silicon Valley during Summer of 1994, One at an energy storage startup called Pinnacle Research Institute, which researched electrolytic ultracapacitors for energy storage and another at the Palo Alto-based startup Rocket Science Games. Musk was accepted to Ph.D program in energy physics and materials science at Stanford University in California but dropped out after two days to join the Internet Boom. Musk even attempted to get a job at Netscape but never got a reply from the company.

He was also involved in X.com and PayPal as a co-founder and CEO before venturing into more futuristic fields.

2. Jeff Bezos












Jeffrey Preston Bezos, the world and we know him as only Jeff Bezos as the Founder of Amazon.com, the largest e-commerce industry in the world and the richest man alive ( according to forbe’s list of billionaires in 2021 ). He was born to Jacklyn and Theodore Jorgensen on January 12, 1964. His Mother was 17 and his father was 19 at the time of his birth. His mother completed her high school despite the challenges and attended night school bringing along baby Jeff. The couple didn’t remained married for long and got divorced soon. His mother married Miguel “Mike” Bezos in April in 1968 and His step-father adopted him shortly after the wedding and Jeff Jorgensen became Jeff Bezos.

Bezos attended River Oaks Elementary School in Houston for two years from fourth to sixth grade, where his parents moved after marriage. His father worked as an engineer for Exxon, an american oil and natural gas company then. Bezos showed keen interest in science and technology and once rigged an electric alaram to keep his younger siblings out of his room.

When his family moved to Miami, He attended Miami Palmetto High School. While in high school, he worked at McDonald’s as Short-order line cook during the breakfast shift. He attended the student Science Training Program at the University of Florida and also a high school valedictorian, a National Merit Scholar, a Silver Knight Award winner in 1982. He was a visionary as he said he dreamed of the day when human kind colonised the space in his graduation speech. His intention was quote as ” to get all people off the earth and see it turned into huge national park ” by the local newspaper. He graduated Latin honors from Princeton University and Bachelor of Science in engineering in Physics and Computer Science. He was aslo a member of various student clubs while at Princeton.

Although Bezos was offered various jobs at Intel, Bell Labs and Andresen Consulting, and other reputed companies then. He first worked at Fitel, which was a fintech telecommunications start-up, he was given the job to build a network for international trade. He was then promoted to head of department and director of of customer service. He become the product manager at Bankers Trust and worked there from 1988 to 1990. He then joined D.E Shaw & co, a newly founded hedge fund that has strong emphasis on mathematical modelling in 1990 and worked there until 1994. At age 30 he became the fourth Vice President of D.E Shaw & Co.

3. Bernard Arnault 


Bernad Arnault was born on 5th March 1949, in Roubaix, France to mother Marie Josèphe Savinel who had a "fascination for Doir" and Father Jean Leon Arnault, who was graduate from École Centrale Paris and owned the Civil Engineering company called Ferret-Savinel.

His full name is Bernad Jean Etienne Arnault, and is a French national and the third richest human according to Forbes (2021) list of richest humans around the world. He is the chairman and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the largest and biggest luxury goods company LVMH. This company acquired some of the celebrity brands around the globe, including Louis Vuitton, Hennessey, Marc, Jacobs, Sephora, and several others.


Although  majority of his wealth comes from his massive stake in Christian Dior SE, the holding company that controls 41.25% of LVMH. His shares in Christian Dior SE, and additional 6.2% in LVMH, are held through his Family-owned holding company, Groupe  Arnault SE.

Arnault began his career in 1971, at Ferret-Savinel soon, after graduating from the École Polytechnique one of the France's finest Engineering school. He soon got appointed as the president of the company and held the position from 1978 to 1984. He later convinced his father to focus the company to real estate and then sold the industrial construction division and renamed Ferinel. Soon thereafter they acquired textile company and relocated their headquarters, they renamed real estate brach to the George V Group. Later sold assets to real estate majority dealing company Nexity.

With some help from senior partner Antonie Bernheim of Lazard Frères, Arnault acquired a luxury goods company Financière Agache. He became the CEO of the company and the subsequently won the bidding for Boussac Saint-Frères. As soons as he took control of Boussac , he fired 9,000 employees in a span of two years. For this he made a nick name for himself as " The Terminator " . Thereafter he sold nearly all the company's assets. But by 1987 the company was profitable again with an estimate earning of $112 million.


 

4. Bill Gates


Bill Gates born as William Gates III to William Henry Gates II and Mary Ann Maxwell Gates on 28th October 1995. He is an American business magnate, Software developer, Investor, Author and Philanthropist. 

He co-founded Microsoft along with his childhood friend Paul Allen (deceased). He was Chairman, Chief Executive Officer (CEO), President, and Chief Software Architect and Advisor during his tenure in microsoft.

He was one of the richest man during the period of 1995 to 2017 and held the title of topmost richest person around the globe ( according to Forbes).

He was finally surpassed by Jeff Bezos in 2017 , the founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Amazon. So the title of top most richest person went to Jeff Bezos. In February 2021 , He is the Fourth richest person around the world by Forbes.

He started many other ventures and philanthropic endeavor post Microsoft, as he step down from day-to-day operation of Microsoft in 2008. He became the Chairperson of several Companies, of those most prominent are BEN, Cascade Investment, bgC3 and Terra Power.

He founded charitable trust Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation along with his wife (now ex-wife) Melinda Gates. Under which they help in social causes.

He and Warren Buffet, a celebrated investor among the financing and stock market industry, founded The Giving Pledge. Where they along with other billionaires individuals pledge to donate at least half of their wealth to social causes.

He also shows great concern in the Climate Change and Energy. So , he urged world Government and respective country's private sector to invest in research and development to make clean energy with low cost. To further support it he announced two initiative at the 2015 United Nation Climate Change Conference in Paris. One was Mission Innovation under which 20 national Governments pledge to double their investment on research and development of carbon free Energy within 5 years of time period. Another was Break Through Energy, a group of top most investors who agreed to fund high risk start-ups in clean energy technologies.

5. Mark Zukerberg



Mark Zuckerberg born as Mark Eliot Zukerberg  to Edward Zuckerberg and Arielle Zukerberg who are Dentist and Psychiatrist by Profession respectively on May 14,1984 in White Plains, New York , United States of America.

In 2007, he was 23 and became the world's youngest self created billionaire . He is a co-founder of Facebook and CEO of Meta Platforms which is a renamed version of Facebook Inc. He is also a Co-founder and Co-Chief Executive Officer of Chan Zuckerberg Initiative along with his wife Priscilla Chan, married in 2012.

As of March 2022, Mark Zukerberg's net worth was 74.5 billion dollars according to the Forbes' Real Time Billionaires list. Time  magazine has named him among the 100 most influential people in the world and list him as its person of the year award which he received in 2010. In December 2016, Forbs list him rank 10th under their contest of The world's Most Powerful People.

In 2010, Zukerberg along with Bill Gate and Warren Buffet signed " The Giving Pledge " , under which they said they would donate half of their wealth to charity over the course of time and also invited other billionaires to join the pledge and donate 50% of their wealth to charity.

Zuckerberg and his Wife Priscilla Chan announced on December 2012 that over the course of their lives they would give majority of their riches to "advancing human potential and promoting equality" under the same spirit of  The Giving Pledge.

On December 19, 2013, Zuckerberg announced a donation of 18 million facebook shares to the  Sillicon Valley Community Foundation.

On the same month The Chronicle of Philanthropy placed Zuckerberg and his Wife at the top of the magazine under the annual list of 50 most generous american humans for 2013, as the have donated roughly 1 billion dollars to charity.

On October 2014, he and his wife donated 25 million dollars to combat the Ebola virus disease, specially the West African Ebola virus epidemic.

On December 1,2015 they pledge to transfer 99% of their facebook shares to the Chan Zukerberg Initiative the valued 45 billion dollars. This however would not take place immediately but over the course of their lives.Unlike other Billionaires they use the structure of a Limited Liability Company (LLC) instead of forming Charitable Corporations . Some Journalist and academics called this kind of philanthropy as Philanthrocapitalism.

During the the Covid-19 Pandemic , Zuckerberg donated 25 million dollars to the Bill and Milinda Gates Foundation that backed accelerator that is researching for the cure for the disease. Also announced 25 million dollars in grants to support local journalism that was impacted due to pandemic and 75 million dollars in advertisement purchase in local newspaper where he would market Facebook Inc.(Now metaverse ) and its products.