BILL GATES, already the world's richest person by a considerable margin,
was confirmed as the world's first $100 billion man after the surge in
American shares made his 21 per cent holding in Microsoft worth more than 12
figures. With each of the 1,031,555,600 shares in the software company he
co-founded in 1975 worth $98.5 (about £62), Mr Gates's personal fortune now
exceeds the economic output of all but the 18 wealthiest nations.
Last week he increased his wealth by more than $1 billion (£650 million)
when the Dow Jones industrial average breached 10,000 points for the first
time, but his achievement is unlikely to be the final chapter in the rise of
William Henry Gates III. His wealth from his Microsoft shares alone (he also
owns several other companies and is the major shareholder in a $9 billion
satellite venture) is so enormous that it fluctuates by tremendous amounts.
For every hour of the past year Mr Gates made about $4,566,000 and if his
wealth continues to grow at the 61 per cent compound annual rate it has
enjoyed so far, he will become the world's first trillionaire, worth
$1,000,000,000,000 in 2004. The statistics of such affluence are baffling.
His personal fortune is more than twice as much as all the $1 bills in
circulation.
On Jan 20, the 43-year-old's riches - at the time already worth more than
the gross domestic products of Singapore and Israel - grew by $3.5 billion
in just three minutes when Microsoft announced its quarterly profits. The
software giant based in Seattle had made $2 billion profit in three months
(up 75 per cent on same period in the previous year); by the end of the day,
its founder was more than $5 billion richer. If the Harvard drop-out was to
stash his cash in dollar bills under the mattress in the $56 million "smart"
home on Lake Washington, near Seattle, where he lives with his wife Melinda
and daughter, he would have to parachute 16 miles down to his bedroom floor
every morning. The United Kingdom's gross national product in 1997 was
$1,220 billion, according to preliminary figures from the World Bank. If Mr
Gates's wealth continues its relentless rise, it will overtake Britain's
output in 2005.
His $101,608,226,600 share holding in Microsoft is worth the same as the
annual output of 4.9 million Britons Even an anti-trust fight with the
American government has not stopped Microsoft's soaring share price. With
the company's products installed on more than 90 per cent of the two billion
personal computers worldwide, analysts believe that Mr Gates cannot lose; if
the governments wins, his company will be split into separate entities, able
to compete even more aggressively than now. Mr Gates's wealth surpassed 12
figures some time ago.
His assets in other companies are estimated to be worth $10 billion to $15
billion, including a third of Teledesic, a $9 billion plan to surround the
world with a network of 288 low-level satellites, due to launch around 2003
And since 1989, when he set up Corbis, Mr Gates has vied with Mark Getty to
dominate one of the richest emerging markets - selling and distributing
digital images.
Through Corbis, Mr Gates owns the Bettmann Collection, home to some of the
most memorable images of the 20th Century and digital rights to the National
Gallery in London and State Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg. Mr Gates
believes biotechnology will be the next big earner. Nobody knows how much he
has invested in Icos Corp, a biological sciences company, and the
Chiroscience Group, a British company involved in mapping the human genome.
Mr Gates's eye has recently turned to property. Last year he bought
Cliveden, the stately home in Berkshire associated with the Profumo Affair.
Other than his hi-tech home, his share of Cliveden and various business
investments, Mr Gates has few expensive tastes. On a recent visit to London
he was dressed in ill-fitting slacks and a white shirt beneath a sweatshirt
given to him by the London Business School. He spent $30 million on the
Leonardo Da Vinci codex; he has a few Porsche cars and only recently
invested in a private jet. Until then, he prided himself on flying around
the world in economy class. Following his pledge to pass only $10 million to
his family, Mr Gates has become one of the world's leading philanthropists.
With his wife he recently pledged $1.5 million to aid Kosovo refugees and
$3.3 billion to their two foundations, the William H Gates Foundation and
the Gates Learning Foundation. In December, they donated $100 million to
improve distribution of child vaccines in developing countries.
The extent of his grip on computers through Microsoft's Windows operating
system was described by his arch-rival Scott McNealy, as a desire to control
the written and spoken language of the digital age. Mr McNealy told the US
Senate anti-trust hearing: "The only thing that I'd rather own than Windows
is English. Because then I could charge you $249 for the right to speak it,
and I could charge you an upgrade fee when I add new letters."
