The third richest man in the world who is worth more than Warren Buffet and Bill Gates | The world | News

On By Littum

The Forbes 2024 Rich List has a list of billionaires who have retained a spot since 2000, but a reshuffle in their ranks puts one man in third place thanks to his growing wealth.

The richest people on the planet today remain largely the same as 20 years ago, but the top three spots have changed.

Elon Musk holds the top spot with Jeff Bezos second, although neither was in the top 20 less than 25 years ago.

Third place goes to billionaire Larry Ellison, who has sat firmly in one of the top 20 spots on the list for the past two decades, despite being less in the spotlight than those in first and second place.

His total net worth is a staggering $217.2 billion (£173.6 billion).

Larry Ellison is chairman, chief technology officer and co-founder of software giant Oracle.

Despite stepping down as CEO in 2014 after 37 years at the helm, he still owns around 40% of the company.

Ellison, 80, founded Oracle in 1977. The company specializes in IT and offers business-oriented products and services.

It ranks as the world’s largest database management company, according to its website.

Oracle’s incredible growth can largely be attributed to acquisitions of software companies – the largest being $28.3bn (£22.6bn) for electronic health records company Cerner in 2021.

The billionaire has had four previous marriages before his current partner and has two children, David and Megan, with his third wife Barbara Boothe.

After stopping as managing director, Mr. Ellison permanently from the US to the Hawaiian island of Lanai, which he bought almost all of in 2012 for $300m (£238m).

After this sat Mr. Ellison on the board of fellow Forbes-listed billionaire, Tesla, from December 2018 to August 2022.

The Oracle founder owned 45 million split-adjusted shares in Elon Musk’s company before stepping down as CEO.

Musk has topped the Forbes Rich List for the second year in a row with a net worth of $449.6bn (£359.5bn). Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, is worth $240.5 billion (£192.2 billion).