Davos: Where The (Big) Money Is

Image by AFP/Getty Images via @daylife

By Forbes’ count, 69 billionaires from 20 countries are expected to attend the annual World Economic Forum confab, which starts tomorrow in the Swiss Alps town of Davos. The helicopters whirring above this afternoon suggest that some may have already arrived.  

It may well be the greatest concentration of wealth in any one place. Their total net worth, as tracked by Forbes: $427 billion, greater than the combined gross domestic product of Israel and Egypt.

The U.S. has at least 20 billionaires expected to make the trip, more than any other country. Most of them are from the tech and finance industries. Among notables are Hedge Fund managers George Soros, Steven A. Cohen and Louis Bacon; heads of private equity firms Stephen Schwarzmann and Henry Kravis, and tech luminaries like Google’s Sergey Brin and Eric Schmidt.

India is a close second with 17 including its two richest citizens, Mukesh Ambani and Lakshmi Mittal. Russia whose president, Dmitry Medvedev, is scheduled to make the opening speech tomorrow night, has 9 of its wealthiest.

Some of these billionaires have been coming to the conference for years. For Bill Gates, it will mark his 16^th year. Gates explained why he makes the trip in his 2010 remarks:   

When I started going in the 1990s the focus was on the wonders of technology and the hot panels were the ones where engineers like myself would discuss how things would improve using technology.

There is some focus every year on reducing the inequities between the rich and the poor which is why the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has found it a good place to discuss new health initiatives.

This year Gates will be participating in a session on Redefining Sustainable Development on Friday, where he’ll be joined by Jim Balsillie, the chairman of Blackberry maker Research in Motion, who is also a billionaire. Gates’ wife Melinda will be a panelist at a session later that day on Raising Healthy Children that will also feature U2 singer Bono and Coca-Cola’s Chief Executive Muhtar A. Kent.

Rahul Bajaj has been coming to the retreat for 33 years, according to an interview in last year’s Economic Times, and will host his annual nightcap at the Hotel Steigenberger Belvedere on Wednesday night; German media baron Hubert Burda and Forbes will host parties at the same time.  

The full list of Davos billionaires, which appears below, only includes people who have appeared on Forbes various wealth lists with a net worth of $1 billion or more. There are others in attendance who we expect will make their debut among the world’s billionaires in March when we release our annual list. Stay tuned,

The billionaires, by country: net worth name country ($bil)
Bill Gates usa 54.00
Sergey Brin usa 15.00
George Soros usa 14.20
Michael Dell usa 14.00
Steven A. Cohen usa 7.30
Jim Goodnight usa 6.90
Rupert Murdoch usa 6.20
Eric Schmidt usa 5.45
Charles W. Ergen usa 5.20
Stephen Schwartzman usa 4.10
Henry Kravis usa 3.40
Nicholas Berggruen usa 2.20
H. Fisk Johnson usa 2.00
David Rubenstein usa 2.00
Marc Benioff usa 1.80
Louis Bacon usa 1.70
Thomas Pritzker usa 1.60
Henry Ross Perot Jr. usa 1.40
Jonathan Nelson usa 1.35
Scott Cook usa 1.20
Mukesh Ambani india 27.00
Lakshmi Mittal india 26.10
Azim Premji india 17.60
Ravi Ruia india 15.00
Kushal Pal Singh india 9.20
Sunil Mittal india 8.60
Kumar Birla india 8.50
Adi Godrej india 7.50
Malvinder Singh india 4.20
Uday Kotak india 3.40
Rahul Bajaj india 3.00
Ajay Piramal india 1.75
Baba Kalyani india 1.72
Nandan Nilekani india 1.60
Kris Gopalakrishnan india 1.50
Vijay Mallya india 1.45
Naresh Goyal india 1.20
Vladimir Lisin russia 15.80
Oleg Deripaska russia 10.70
Vagit Alekperov russia 10.60
Alexei Mordashov russia 9.90
Vladimir Yevtushenkov russia 7.50
Viktor Vekselberg russia 6.40
Leonid Mikhelson russia 4.40
Dmitry Pumpyansky russia 2.90
Roustam Tariko russia 1.40
Elizabeth Mohn Germany 4.40
Hubert Burda Germany 2.50
Friede Springer Germany 2.50
Stefan von Holtzbrinck Germany 1.80
Sri Prakash Lohia indonesia 2.65
Chairul Tanjung indonesia 1.25
Ernesto Bertarelli switzerland 10.00
Thomas Schmidheiny switzerland 4.30
Ferit Sahenk turkey 2.10
Tuncay Ozilhan turkey 1.30
Jim Balsillie canada 2.30
Zhang Xin china 3.10
Mario Moretti Polegato italy 2.40
Timur Kulibaev Kazakhstan 1.10
Najib Mikati lebanon 2.50