Brad Greenspan is an American entrepreneur who has a net worth of $5 million. Brad Greenspan earned his fortune thanks to his involvement in the founding of several large web properties, most notably MySpace.

In 1998, he founded eUniverse Inc.. In 2003 eUniverse launched the early social network MySpace. Greenspan worked with Chris DeWolfe, Josh Berman and Tom Anderson to develop the popular website. Brad resigned from eUniverse in late 2003. At the time of his resignation, Brad Greenspan owned 23% of eUniverse, which was actually a publicly-traded company. When NewsCorp acquired MySpace for $580 million in October 2005, Greenspan owned 10% of the company. He therefore presumably received a roughly $58 million pre-tax windfall.

Greenspan famously did NOT want MySpace to sell to NewsCorp for only $580 million. He, perhaps correctly, believed MySpace was worth significantly more. He launched a lawsuit that was not successful. To his point, less than a year after the acquisition, MySpace signed a deal with Google that guaranteed it $900 million in revenue for being an exclusive ad partner.

Greenspan went on to develop Asian web company Broadwebasia, a line of health products called Borba and a secondary social network known as LiveUniverse.

(Photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez/ Getty Images for Davidson & Choy Publicity)

Career Beginnings

Brad Greenspan was born in 1971 in Los Angeles, California. He attended the University of California, Los Angeles, where he studied political science. After graduating from UCLA, Greenspan worked as an investment banker at Morgan Stanley. In 1995, he founded his own investment bank, Palisades Capital.

eUniverse and MySpace

In February 1999, Greenspan founded eUniverse (Entertainment Universe), an internet company that focused on building and buying online communities. Over the course of its existence, eUniverse acquired several smaller internet companies, including CDUniverse and Excite@Home. He actually took eUniverse public. Years later when MySpace was thriving, eUniverse was traded on the Pink Sheets under the ticker symbol EUNI.

In 2003, eUniverse launched a social net working site they called MySpace. They bought the domain from a business called YourZ which had been planning to use it as an online storage and sharing site.

Several of the company's early employees and founders wanted MySpace to charge users a fee for the service. It was Greenspan who insisted it stay a free service. Obviously that was a smart choice as MySpace soon became became one of the most popular websites in the world.

Greenspan resigned from eUniverse in October 2003 amid a board room battle. He stepped down as a company director in December 2003. At that point he released a statement in which he claimed his fellow directors had breached their fiduciary duties. At this point he owned 23% of eUniverse's equity.

In 2004 eUniverse was renamed Intermix Media and Richard Rosenblatt was named CEO.

NewsCorp Acquisition

In 2005, News Corporation acquired MySpace for $12 a share, a total value of $580 million. Brad Greenspan was one of the largest shareholders, owned 10% of MySpace's parent company which had been renamed Intermix Media. That would imply he received a $58 million windfall from the sale.

Interestingly, Greenspan actually opposed the sale, believing that $580 million was drastically too low. He launched an effort called FreeMySpace LLC in an attempt to rally other shareholders to demand a bigger upside in the acquisition. Those efforts ultimately failed and NewsCorp successfully acquired MySpace in October 2005.

News Corporation made a number of changes to MySpace, but the site lost popularity to newer social networking sites, such as Facebook.

In 2011, News Corporation spun off MySpace into a separate company. The new company, MySpace Inc., was acquired by Specific Media in 2013. Specific Media has made a number of changes to MySpace, but the site has not regained its former popularity.

MySpace is still in existence today, but it is no longer one of the most popular social networking sites in the world. The site has around 1 million active users, compared to Facebook's 3 billion active users.

LiveUniverse

After the dust from the MySpace sale settled, Brad launched a new company called LiveUniverse. LiveUniverse soon launched or bought more than 30 properties, including video-sharing site called Revver and MySpace-like site called Pageflakes.

LiveUniverse was effectively shuttered in late 2010.

In October 2012 LiveUniverse and Brad Greenspan personally were hit with a $6.6 million default judgement by a federal judge over running a lyrics website that did not pay licenses for the lyrics. The judgement worked out to $12,500 per song for 528 songs whose lyrics were allegedly used without a license.

Real Estate

In November 2004 Brad Greenspan paid $2.9 million for a home in the Hollywood Hills. In May 2008, a burglary at the home earned a few headlines in the LA papers. Brad listed this home for sale in April 2009 for $3.55 million. He ultimately accepted $2.43 million in June 2013.

Read more: Brad Greenspan Net Worth

Shin Dong-Bin is a South Korean businessman who has a net worth of $900 million. Shin Dong-bin (Korean: 신동빈; Hanja: 辛東彬) is a Korean-Japanese businessman. He is the chairman and CEO of Lotte Group, one of the largest conglomerates in South Korea. He is the second son of Shin Kyuk-ho, the founder of Lotte Group.

In 1993, Shin Dong-bin was appointed CEO of Lotte's Japanese operations. He oversaw a period of rapid growth for the company, and Lotte became one of the largest conglomerates in Japan. Shin Dong-bin was also instrumental in expanding Lotte's operations into China and other Asian countries.

In 2010, Shin Dong-bin's older brother, Shin Dong-joo, was removed from his position as CEO of Lotte Group. This led to a bitter feud between the two brothers, as they both vied for control of the company. In 2015, Shin Dong-bin was able to consolidate his control of Lotte Group, and he has been the chairman and CEO of the company ever since.

In addition to his business career, Shin Dong-bin has also been active in philanthropy. He is the founder of the Lotte Foundation, which provides scholarships to students from disadvantaged backgrounds. He is also a member of the World Economic Forum's Young Global Leaders program.

Shin Dong-bin is a complex and contradictory figure. He is a successful businessman who has achieved great things, but he is also a man who has been accused of serious wrongdoing. His story is a reminder that even the most successful people are not immune to the human flaws of greed, ambition, and power.

Early Life

Shin Dong-bin was born in Tokyo, Japan, in 1956. He is the second son of Shin Kyuk-ho, the founder of Lotte Group. His mother, Keiko Takeda, was a Japanese national. Shin Dong-bin has an older brother, Shin Dong-joo, and a younger sister, Shin Young-ja.

Shin Dong-bin attended Aoyama Gakuin University in Tokyo, where he studied economics. After graduating from university, he worked for Nomura Securities' London branch for two years.

Early Career

In 1988, Shin Dong-bin joined Lotte Group, where he worked in a variety of roles, including as the head of Lotte's U.S. branch. In 1993, he was appointed CEO of Lotte's Japanese operations. He oversaw a period of rapid growth for the company, and Lotte became one of the largest conglomerates in Japan.

Jeon Heon-Kyun-Pool/Getty Images

Succession Battle

In 2010, Shin Dong-bin's older brother, Shin Dong-joo, was removed from his position as CEO of Lotte Group. This led to a bitter feud between the two brothers, as they both vied for control of the company. The feud came to a head in 2015, when Shin Dong-bin was able to consolidate his control of Lotte Group, and he has been the chairman and CEO of the company ever since.

Legal Problems

In 2018 Shin Dong-bin was sentenced to 30 months in prison after being found guilty of charges of allegedly giving a bribe worth the equivalent of $6.5 million to a confidante of the former President of South Korea. The sentence was eventually suspended and reduced to time served.

Philanthropy

Shin Dong-bin is a philanthropist. He is the founder of the Lotte Foundation, which provides scholarships to students from disadvantaged backgrounds. He is also a member of the World Economic Forum's Young Global Leaders program.

Personal Life

Shin Dong-bin is married to Manami Shigemitsu. They have two children, a son and a daughter.

Read more: Shin Dong-Bin Net Worth

Galen Weston was an English-Canadian businessman and philanthropist who had a net worth of $7 billion at the time of his death.

Galen Weston was a billionaire businessman who chaired his family's food processing and distribution company George Weston Limited. He was one of the top bakers in Canada through the company's subsidiary Weston Foods, serving as the owner and CEO of the leading Canadian supermarket chain Loblaws. Weston owned many other retail businesses during his lifetime, including Selfridges in the UK, Brown Thomas in Ireland, and De Bijenkorf in the Netherlands.

Early Life and Education

Galen Weston was born as Willard Gordon Galen Weston on October 29, 1940 in Marlow, Buckinghamshire, England as the youngest of nine children of Reta and W. Garfield Weston. His grandfather, George Weston, established the international food processing and distribution company George Weston Limited. The family moved back to its native Canada in 1945, but moved frequently as W. Garfield pursued various business ventures, including supermarket chains in Europe and North America. Growing up, Galen Weston worked in many of the stores that made up his father's retail holdings. For his education, he attended the elite St Paul's School in London, and then studied business administration in Canada at Huron University College and the University of Western Ontario.

Career Beginnings

In 1962, Weston moved to Dublin, Ireland, where he established his own grocery store. By 1965, his business had expanded to six stores, and by the end of the decade he had purchased a bankrupt department store that he renamed Penneys. Weston continued expanding his business, opening multiple Penneys stores outside of Dublin. In the early 1970s, he widened his grocery holdings by acquiring his competitor Quinnsworth. Weston also bought an interest in the Dublin department store Brown Thomas.

Loblaws

In early 1972, Weston was appointed the CEO of Loblaw Companies, the Ontario-based food retailer of George Weston Limited. The company was deeply in debt at the time, and appeared to be headed for bankruptcy. As the CEO, Weston consolidated operations and closed 78 Loblaws locations that were losing money. He hired designer Don Watt to remodel one of the company's Toronto outlets, resulting in dramatically improved sales. Additionally, Weston brought in new management and led a high-profile advertising campaign that featured "Star Trek" actor William Shatner. Among his other revitalization efforts, he invested around $40 million in the development of private label brands, including the No Name line, which consisted of 16 generic products in simple black-and-yellow packaging. Due to the incredible success of the line, Loblaws opened a store called No Frills that featured No Name products as well as a limited selection of discount items. Soon, older stores were converted into No Frills outlets. By the end of the 1970s, Loblaws had returned to profitability.

Continuing his success as head of Loblaws, Weston launched another popular product line, President's Choice, in the early 1980s. The premium line featured products endorsed by Loblaws president Dave Nichol. Loblaws continued to expand throughout the decade, becoming the largest and most profitable grocery retailer in Canada. By the 1990s, the company's popular No Name and President's Choice product lines accounted for $1.5 billion of its revenue, with sales extending into the United States. However, as part of a restructuring in 1995, Loblaws divested the last of its US retail holdings. Weston subsequently oversaw the further expansion of Canadian retail operations by purchasing Agora Foods and Provigo. In the US, he expanded bakery operations with the acquisition of Bestfoods Baking. Although Loblaws recorded its first loss in nearly two decades in 2006, it returned to profitability the following year. Several major assets were sold off in 2008, including Neilson Dairy and Stroehmann Bakeries. Loblaws subsequently acquired T&T Supermarket in 2009.

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Other Business Ventures

Among his many other business ventures, Weston chaired the Canadian luxury goods retailer Holt, Renfrew & Co. in the 1980s. He acquired full ownership of the Irish department store chain Brown Thomas in 1984. Later, in the early 00s, Weston acquired the British department store chain Selfridges, through which he purchased the Dutch department store chain De Bijenkorf and the Montreal department store Ogilvy.

In the US, Weston and his wife helped develop the private residential development Windsor in Vero Beach, Florida. Combining Weston's interests in modern architecture and commercial planning, the development sits on 425 acres and contains 350 residences. It also boasts a full-service equestrian center and an 18-hole golf course.

Philanthropy

Weston was heavily involved in philanthropy during his life through the W. Garfield Weston Foundation. The Foundation supports Canadian students through its Garfield Weston Awards and various scholarships, and contributes substantially to the Nature Conservancy of Canada. Additionally, it funds scientific research and provides financial support to an array of nonprofits. Beyond the Foundation, Weston served as president of the board of the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair and as the chief fundraiser and chairman of the Lester B. Pearson United World College of the Pacific. He also made significant contributions to the Canadian conservative think-tank the Fraser Institute.

Personal Life and Death

In 1966, Weston married Irish fashion model Hilary Frayne. She later became a businesswoman, philanthropist, and politician, serving as Lieutenant Governor of Ontario from 1997 to 2002. Weston and Frayne had two children named Alannah and Galen Jr., both born in 1972. The couple had multiple residences, including in the UK, Ireland, Canada, US, and the Bahamas. In the summer of 1983, Weston was the target of a thwarted kidnapping attempt by the IRA in Ireland.

In 2016, Weston retired as chairman of the family company, and was succeeded by his son. He passed away at his Toronto home in April of 2021 following a long illness; he was 80 years of age.

Read more: Galen Weston Net Worth

Ricky Van Veen is an American entrepreneur who has a net worth of $25 million. Ricky Van Veen earned his fortune as the co-founder of online comedy company, CollegeHumor. Van Veen co-founded CollegeHumor.com with Josh Abramson in 1999. Over the next several years the site grew to attract millions of monthly visitors who enjoyed CollegeHumor's videos, images, illustrations and articles. CollegeHumor would eventually branch into the TShirt business with their company BustedTees, and a production company that has been involved with TV and film. The website has also produced several television series and hopes to branch out in to movies. In 2006, CollegeHumor was acquired by InterActiveCorp (IAC) for $25 million. Before the acquisition, the company was earning $15 million per year.

Ricky currently serves as Head of Global Creative Strategy at Facebook. Among his other projects, Van Veen was previously the CEO of Notional, a television production company and was a co-founder of a company called Connected Ventures which owned an early equity stake in Vimeo. He is also known for being married to actress Allison Williams from 2015 to 2019.

Early Life and Education

Ricky Van Veen was born on December 14, 1980 in Lutherville-Timonium, Maryland to Helen and Richard Sr. As a young adult, he attended Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, graduating in 2003 with a degree in management and information systems.

CollegeHumor

While he was a student at Wake Forest in late 1999, Van Veen co-founded the website CollegeHumor with his old high school friend Josh Abramson. In the beginning, they used the site to post humorous photos, essays, and videos their friends created. Eventually, CollegeHumor expanded into a major online comedy company with original comedy content posted on YouTube. Among its staple features are CH Originals, which are sketches and short films written and produced by the CollegeHumor staff. Members include Emily Axford, Brian Murphy, and Adam Conover. CH Originals encompass everything from film and television parodies to music videos and animation, with notable series including "Jake and Amir," "Full Benefits," "POV," "Adam Ruins Everything," "Troopers," and "Hot Date." By the end of 2022, the CollegeHumor YouTube channel had amassed more than seven billion views and over 14 million subscribers.

In 2018, CollegeHumor established the subscription-based streaming service Dropout, which became the host for a number of new scripted and unscripted series. Following the company's sale to Sam Reich in 2020, the platform began featuring unscripted series only due to budget constraints. On Dropout, CollegeHumor's series have included the live play tabletop role-playing show "Dimension 20" and the game shows "Game Changer" and "Um, Actually." Among other CollegeHumor projects was "The CollegeHumor Show," a short-lived sitcom that aired on MTV in 2009. Van Veen appeared as a fictionalized version of himself on the show, alongside Sam Reich, Dan Gurewitch, Amir Blumenfeld, Jake Hurwitz, and Sarah Schneider.

Neilson Barnard/Getty Images

Vimeo

In late 2004, the video-sharing website Vimeo was founded by Jake Lodwick and Zach Klein. Originally created as a spinoff of CollegeHumor, the site was mainly used to share humorous videos among colleagues. Both CollegeHumor and Vimeo were acquired by IAC in 2006. Vimeo, which in addition to hosting videos provides subscribers with tools for video creation, editing, broadcasting, and more, has over 260 million users and around 1.6 million subscribers. In the spring of 2021, it became a standalone public company.

Other Ventures

In the summer of 2009, Van Veen was announced as the CEO of a new production company called Notional. Focused on production for linear television, the company is responsible for the reality-based cooking game show "Chopped," which has aired on the Food Network since 2009. Later, in 2015, Van Veen co-founded the product company Scroll Commerce, through which he creates products to sell online, such as the popular Homesick Candle. The company was acquired by BuzzFeed to serve as the foundation of its new Product Labs division.

Facebook

In 2016, Van Veen was hired by Facebook in the new position of Head of Global Creative Strategy. His activities in that role include working with various media companies and creators to boost audience engagement on the social media platform.

Personal Life

Van Veen married his first wife, actress Allison Williams, in 2015. The pair divorced in 2019. Van Veen went on to wed Caroline Kassie, the business partner of Chelsea Clinton, in the summer of 2021.

Read more: Ricky Van Veen Net Worth

Angelo Mozilo was an American executive who had a net worth of $600 million at the time of his death in July 2023. Angelo Mozilo was best known for being the former chairman of the board and CEO of Countrywide Financial. He served as CEO until July 1, 2008, just a few months before the financial crisis. During his time at Countrywide, Angelo earned hundreds of millions of dollars in compensation and sold at least $400 million worth of his shares.

Countrywide was a pioneer in the nationwide non-bank mortgage industry. When subprime loans came onto the scene in the late '80s (Guardian S&L) and '90s (The Money Store), his company did not participate. He reportedly (privately) described the subprime loan mavericks of the '90s as "crooks". His company, however, was losing business to the subprime lenders and had to compete with them or continue to lose market share. By the early 2000s, Countrywide began using subprime loans in a major way. After the market crash of 2008/2009, Countrywide soon symbolized and bore much of the blame for, the subprime mortgage crisis.

In a 2008 New York Times feature, Henry G. Cisneros, former secretary of HUD and member of the Countrywide board of directors, described Mozilo as "sick with stress—the final chapter of his life is the infamy that's been brought on him, or that he brought on himself." CNN named Mozilo as one of the Ten Most Wanted: Culprits' of the 2008 financial collapse in the United States, a theory further supported in "Inside Job," an Academy Award-winning documentary on the global financial crisis.

Over many years, Mozilo sold hundreds of millions of dollars in stock, personally, even while publicly touting the stock and using shareholder funds to buy back stock to support the share price.

On June 4, 2009, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission charged him with insider trading and securities fraud. The terms of the settlement allowed Mozilo to avoid acknowledging any wrongdoing. Countrywide was to pay $20 million of the $67.5 million penalty because of an indemnification agreement that was part of Mozilo's employment contract. In February 2011, the U.S. dropped its criminal investigation into the facts behind the civil settlement.

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Early Life

Angelo Mozilo was born on November 29, 1938, in the Bronx, New York, to a first-generation Italian-American family. He was greatly influenced by his parents' struggles as immigrants, which kindled in him a strong work ethic and a deep commitment to providing opportunities for homeownership to underserved communities.

After graduating from Fordham University in 1960 with a degree in economics, Mozilo started his professional journey in the mortgage industry.

Countrywide Financial Corporation

In 1969, along with his business partner David Loeb, Mozilo founded Countrywide Credit Industries, later renamed Countrywide Financial Corporation. They began as a two-man operation and grew it into a national enterprise that serviced millions of loans. As CEO, Mozilo focused on simplifying mortgage lending and making homeownership more accessible to Americans.

Countrywide's growth was impressive, eventually becoming the nation's largest mortgage lender. The company was praised for its advancements in computerized loan processing, and it played a crucial role in creating a secondary market for mortgages by selling loans to government-sponsored entities like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Subprime Mortgage Crisis and Controversy

However, Countrywide's success story turned sour when the U.S. housing bubble burst in 2007. The company had aggressively pursued subprime lending, offering mortgages to high-risk borrowers. When the market collapsed, many of these borrowers defaulted, contributing significantly to the 2008 financial crisis.

Mozilo's leadership during this period attracted significant controversy. He was accused of misleading investors about the riskiness of Countrywide's loan portfolio and of making millions through insider trading.

Bank of America acquired Countrywide in July 2008 for $4.1 billion. The acquisition would go on to cost BofA billions upon billions of dollars. Angelo retired a few months after the deal closed. Around this time he made a number of glowing statements about his former company's future prospects, while also offloading $140 million worth of his own shares.

Legal Proceedings and Later Life

In 2009, Mozilo was charged by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for securities fraud and insider trading. He agreed to a settlement in 2010, which included a lifetime ban from serving as an officer or director of any public company, without admitting or denying the allegations.

Mozilo largely retreated from public life following the settlement. However, he has occasionally commented on the state of the mortgage industry, maintaining his belief that every American should have the opportunity to own a home.

Legacy

Angelo Mozilo's legacy is multifaceted. His early innovations in the mortgage industry and his commitment to making homeownership accessible to more Americans have had a lasting impact. However, his leadership during the subprime mortgage crisis and the ensuing legal consequences have left a stain on his reputation.

Read more: Angelo Mozilo Net Worth

James Jebbia is a businessman and fashion designer who has a net worth of $800 million. James Jebbia is best known for founding the New York City-based skateboarding lifestyle and clothing brand Supreme. Beyond the United States, the company has stores in such places as London, Paris, Milan, and multiple locations in Japan. Prior to entering the business and fashion worlds, Jebbia was a child actor in the first season of the British children's television series "Grange Hill."

In 2017 private equity firm Carlyle Group spent $500 million to acquire a 50% stake in Supreme, valuing the brand at $1 billion.

In November 2020 it was announced that Supreme had been acquired by VF Corp. for $2.1 billion.

Early Life

James Jebbia was born on July 22, 1963 in New York City to an English mother and an American father who had served in the United States Air Force. When he was still an infant, he moved with his parents to Crawley, West Sussex, England. Jebbia's parents divorced when he was 10 years old. As a young adult in 1983, he moved back to the United States and settled in Staten Island.

Child Actor

Jebbia began his professional career as a child actor in the late 1970s. He played Tommy Watson in the first season of the children's television series "Grange Hill," focused on the eponymous fictional comprehensive school in the fictional North London borough of Northam. The show was infamous for its gritty depiction of school life, which significantly deviated from the more sanitized portrayals of earlier school-based dramas. "Grange Hill" tackled such taboo topics as drug use, homosexuality, mental illness, child abuse, and sexual assault.

Career Beginnings in Fashion

After returning to the States in 1983, Jebbia landed his first job in New York at the minimalist skate shop and clothing store Parachute. Later in the decade, he founded and began managing the streetwear store Union NYC, which carried predominantly English clothing brands; opened in 1989, it was located on Spring Street in Manhattan before moving to Los Angeles. Jebbia subsequently partnered with Shawn Stussy, founder of the clothing brand Stüssy, from 1991 to 1994.

James Gebbia/ Getty Images

Supreme

In the spring of 1994, Jebbia founded the skateboarding lifestyle and clothing brand Supreme. Geared toward streetwear culture and the skateboarding and hip hop scenes, the company's first store was in an old office space in Lower Manhattan. Early employees included extras from Larry Clark's seminal film "Kids." In 2004, a second store opened on Fairfax in Los Angeles, California, which doubled the size of the original New York City location. Supreme went on to open stores internationally in Paris, London, Milan, and multiple places in Japan, including Tokyo and Nagoya. The company also has other stores stateside in San Francisco and Chicago. In addition to its own clothing label, Supreme stocks other skateboard brands such as Nike SB, Thrasher, and Vans.

Over the years, Supreme has formed numerous partnerships with other major brands, including Louis Vuitton, Emilio Pucci, Champion, Timberland, Lacoste, and True Religion. The company has also collaborated with many high-profile artists, such as Takashi Murakami, Jeff Koons, Mark Flood, John Baldessari, and Damien Hirst. Japanese fashion designer Yohji Yamamoto has also lent his designs to the brand.

In 2017, Jebbia confirmed that roughly 50% of Supreme had been sold to the private equity firm the Carlyle Group. A few years later, VF Corporation acquired Supreme in an all-cash deal for around $2.1 billion. Jebbia has continued to manage the business following the purchase.

Personal Life

With his wife Bianca, Jebbia has two children: a son named Miles and a daughter named Nina. The family resides in the West Village in Lower Manhattan, New York City.

Read more: James Jebbia Net Worth

Andre Harrell was an American record and film producer who had a net worth of $50 million at the time of his death in 2020. He was notable for being the founder of Uptown Records which helped launch many careers of artists and executives. At Uptown, Andre discovered Sean "Diddy" Combs who rose from unpaid intern to Vice President within a few short years. Unfortunately, Andre died on May 8, 2020 at the age of 59.

Early Life

Andre Harrell was born in Harlem, New York in September 1960. Harrell formed the hip hop duo Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde with his high school friend Quadie Campbell. The group had three hit singles: "Genius Rap", "Fast Life", and "AM/PM".

He went to Lehman College to become a newscaster but dropped out. After dropping out he went to work at a radio station as an account executive. In 1983 Andre met Russell Simmons, who had just founded Def Jam Records, and was offered a job. His starting salary was $200 a week which he ultimately decided to split with Lyor Cohen in order to get him to come on board. Andre rose the ranks and worked for Simmons' company Rush Communications eventually becoming a Vice President and general manager.

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Uptown Records

Andre left Rush Communications in 1986 to launch his own label which he called Uptown Records. In 1990 Uptown hired an eager unpaid intern named Sean Combs. Sean, who would later be known as Puff Daddy and then Diddy, would famously travel back and forth between New York City and Howard University in Washington D.C. where he was a business major. He dropped out after his sophomore year to pursue music full-time at Uptown.

Combs soon rose to the position of talent director and A&R rep at Uptown. In this position Combs developed acts such as Mary J. Blige and Jodeci. Within two years at the company, Diddy was a Vice President. He was just 22 years old. Diddy was fired from Uptown in 1991 after a charity basketball game ended in tragedy with nine deaths and dozens of injuries. Diddy would soon launch Bad Boy Records which would go on to have enormous success with many artists.

Upton Entertainment

In June of 1992 Harrell landed a $50 million, seven-year investment from MCA. With the investment he re-named his company Uptown Entertainment. Through Uptown Entertainment Harrell produced several television shows and movies. One of his biggest TV hits was the series "New York Undercover" which ran from 1994 to 1998. He soon renamed the label again, this time to Uptown Enterprises. He produced the films Strictly Business and Honey.

Harrell became the CEO of Motown Records in 1995. Two decades after firing him, Andre Harrell was hired by Diddy to serve as Vice Chairman of Revolt, Diddy's multi-platform entertainment network.

Death

Tragically, Andre Harrell died on May 7, 2020 at the age of 59. He had reportedly been suffering from heart problems around the time of his death.

Read more: Andre Harrell Net Worth

Henry Samueli is an American tech entrepreneur and sports team owner who has a net worth of $10 billion. Dr. Henry Samueli earned his fortune as the co-founder of semi-conductor/software conglomerate Broadcom Corp. His significant contributions to the semiconductor industry and his visionary approach to business have had a profound impact on the technology landscape. Along with his professional achievements, Samueli's philanthropic efforts demonstrate his commitment to social responsibility and community betterment. In 2005 Henry Samueli purchased the NHL's Anaheim Ducks franchise. The Ducks won the NHL championship two years later.

Early Life

Henry Samueli was born in Buffalo, New York on September 20, 1954.

His family moved to Los Angeles, California, when he was a child. Samueli showed early promise in math and science, sparking a lifelong interest in technology and engineering. He received his bachelor's degree, master's degree, and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).

College

Before co-founding Broadcom, Samueli had an illustrious academic career. He joined the Electrical Engineering faculty at UCLA in 1985, where he focused his research on communications systems. Later, he transferred to the University of California, Irvine (UCI) as a professor. His time in academia influenced his approach to business, emphasizing innovation and lifelong learning.

Broadcom

In 1991, Samueli co-founded Broadcom Corporation with Henry Nicholas, a fellow UCLA graduate. The pair started the company with the goal of developing semiconductor technology for the broadband communications market. The two Henrys both chipped-in $5,000 to launch the business.

Under Samueli's leadership as Chief Technical Officer, Broadcom pioneered a series of innovations that propelled it to a leading position in the industry. The company went public in 1998, making Samueli a billionaire.

Broadcom reached $1 billion in revenue faster than any US semiconductor company in history. By 2011, the company's revenues reached $7.4 billion. In 2016 Broadcom was acquired by Avago Technologies for $37 billion.

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Philanthropy

Samueli's commitment to the community is evident in his significant philanthropic activities. Alongside his wife, Susan, he established the Samueli Foundation to invest in education, health, youth services, and Jewish culture. He also owns the Anaheim Ducks National Hockey League team and has invested in the renovation and management of the Honda Center, contributing to the vitality of Southern California's sports and entertainment scene.

Ownership of the Anaheim Ducks

In 2005, Samueli and his wife purchased the Anaheim Ducks, a professional ice hockey team. As a sports enthusiast and former competitive ice dancer, Samueli's ownership of the team reflected his personal passion. His leadership has been marked by an emphasis on community involvement, with the team contributing to various local charitable initiatives.

Recognition and Honors

Over his career, Samueli has received numerous awards and honors that recognize his achievements in business and philanthropy. These include the Marconi Society Prize and Fellowship, the UCLA Medal, and the Ellis Island Medal of Honor. His induction into the National Academy of Engineering is a testament to his significant contributions to the field of electrical engineering.

Legacy and Current Endeavors

Samueli remains a prominent figure in the world of technology and philanthropy. His visionary leadership of Broadcom revolutionized the semiconductor industry, while his philanthropic endeavors continue to support education and community development. Currently, Samueli serves as Chairman of the Board of Broadcom Inc. He also continues to be involved in academia as a Distinguished Adjunct Professor in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at UCI.

Personal Life

Henry Samueli and his wife Susan live in Newport Beach, California. They have pledged to donate at least half their wealth to charity.

Henry Samueli's private life could not be more different than the private life of his Broadcom co-founder Henry Nicholas. Nicholas' private life has been dotted with controversies for years. Nicholas has been accused of securities fraud. His wife allegedly left him after catching him high on drugs having sex with a prostitute. He reportedly used a man cave under his mansion to host drug-fueled orgies with prostitutes. And in 2018 Nicholas was arrested in a Las Vegas hotel room after police found an unresponsive woman with a deflated balloon in her mouth AND two suitcases full of heroin, MDMA and cocaine.

Read more: Henry Samueli Net Worth

Howard Buffett is a businessman, philanthropist, author, and former politician who has a net worth of $400 million. The middle child of billionaire business magnate Warren Buffett, Howard Buffett has held executive positions at numerous corporations, including the Archer-Daniels-Midland Company, the GSI Group, ConAgra Foods, and the Coca-Cola Company. He is also the CEO and chairman of the Howard G. Buffett Foundation, through which he supports various humanitarian and environmental projects.

Early Life

Howard Buffett was born on December 16, 1954 in Omaha, Nebraska as the middle child of activist Susan Thompson and billionaire business magnate Warren Buffett. His siblings are Susan and Peter. He was named after his grandfather Howard.

Farming

Before establishing himself in the world of business, Buffett worked as a farmer in Tekamah, Nebraska in the late 1970s. There, his father purchased a property for $760,000, and charged him rent to live there.

Business Career

Buffett has served in various executive positions at numerous major corporations over the years, particularly at ones related to agriculture. From 1991 to 1995, he was the director of the Archer-Daniels-Midland Company, a multinational food processing and commodities trading corporation in Chicago, Illinois. Buffett also served as the company's vice president and assistant to the chairman from 1992 to 1995. In the former year, he became a director at Berkshire Hathaway and the president of Buffett Farms. Also in the 1990s, Buffett began serving as a director at Coca-Cola Enterprises, the world's largest Coca-Cola bottler. He remained in that position until 2004. Six years later, Buffett became a director at the Coca-Cola Company.

Among his other major executive positions, Buffett served as the head of the board of directors of the GSI Group from 1995 to 2001. Meanwhile, from 1995 to early 2010, he was a director at Lindsay Corporation; he also served as that company's chairman from 2002 to 2003. Elsewhere, Buffett was the director of ConAgra Foods from 2002 to 2006.

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Political Career

In addition to his business endeavors, Buffett has been involved in state politics as a Republican. From 1989 to 1992, he served as a county commissioner in Douglas County, Nebraska. He also served as the chairman of the Nebraska Ethanol Authority and Development Board during that time. Much later, in 2017, Buffett became the sheriff of Macon County, Illinois after former sheriff Thomas Schneider resigned. He went on to run for the Republican nomination in 2021, but suspended his campaign due to disagreements over changes in state legislation impacting the position of sheriff.

Philanthropy

Buffett is substantially involved in philanthropic activities, particularly through his Howard G. Buffett Foundation, of which he is the CEO and chairman. The Foundation supports various humanitarian causes, as well as projects in the areas of agriculture, environmental conversation, and nutrition. Much of its funding is focused on Africa and Central America. In 2007, the HGBF launched the Global Water Initiative to provide clean water to underprivileged communities. Later, the Foundation entered a three-year initiative with the Nature Conservation Trust and South African National Parks to combat rhino poaching in South Africa. Elsewhere, the HGBF contributed $200 million to the development of Tibú, Colombia, home to the second-largest coca crop in the country.

Among his other philanthropic endeavors, Buffett founded the International Cheetah Conservation Foundation, and was a founding director of the Cougar Fund. He has been involved with such organizations as the National Geographic Council of Advisors, the Nature Conservancy, Ecotrust, and the Africa Foundation. In 2010, Buffett became a member of the Eastern Congo Initiative, which was founded by Ben Affleck. The next year, he partnered with the Bridgeway Foundation.

Books

Buffett has written a number of books about ecological conservation and the human condition. In 2001, he released "One the Edge: Balancing Earth's Resources," and in 2002 released "Tapestry of Life." Buffett subsequently co-wrote the cheetah-oriented book "Spots Before Your Eyes" with Ann van Dyk. His other books include "Threatened Kingdom: The Story of the Mountain Gorilla"; "Fragile: The Human Condition"; and "Our 50-State Border Crisis: How the Mexican Border Fuels the Drug Epidemic Across America." Additionally, with his son Howard, he co-wrote the New York Times bestseller "Forty Chances: Finding Hope in a Hungry World."

Personal Life

In 1977, Buffett wed his first wife, Marcia Duncan. He married his second wife, Devon Morse, in 1983; they have a son named Howard who teaches at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs. Previously, he worked in the White House under Barack Obama.

Buffett lives in Decatur, Illinois. He also oversees a 1,500-acre family farm in Pana, Illinois, as well as three research farms in Arizona and South Africa.

Read more: Howard Buffett Net Worth

Neil Clark Warren is an American psychologist, theologian, entrepreneur, and motivational speaker who has a net worth of $250 million. In 2000, Neil Clark Warren co-founded eHarmony with his son-in-law, Greg Forgatch. Warren served as CEO of eHarmony until 2007, when he stepped down to become chairman. He returned as CEO in 2012, but stepped down again in 2016. Warren remains chairman of eHarmony.

In 2017, eHarmony was acquired by German media company ProSiebenSat.1 Media for $575 million. Warren and Forgatch were both shareholders in eHarmony, and they received a significant portion of the sale proceeds. However, the exact amount of money that Warren received is not publicly known.

Early Life and Education

Neil Clark Warren was born on September 18, 1934 in Des Moines, Iowa to automobile dealer Otis and homemaker Rosa. From an early age, he was interested in matters of personal relationships and compatibility. Although his parents had a long and happy marriage, Warren saw that they often had difficulty communicating with each other.

For his higher education, Warren went to Pepperdine University, from which he graduated in 1956. He went on to earn his master's degree in divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary in 1959. Following that, Warren pursued a doctorate in clinical psychology at the University of Chicago, graduating with his Ph.D. in 1967.

Teaching and Clinical Psychology

Warren began his career as a professor at his alma mater the University of Chicago. He then moved to Pasadena, California, where he became a professor at Fuller Theological Seminary before becoming the dean of the seminary's Graduate School of Psychology. Meanwhile, Warren also worked as a clinical psychologist in his own private practice, focusing on marriage compatibility. It was that experience that nurtured his interest in helping singles find lasting relationships.

eHarmony

In 1995, Warren and his son-in-law Greg Forgatch founded the seminar company Neil Clark Warren & Associates. Eventually, in 2000, the company became the dating website eHarmony. The first algorithm-based dating site, it works by matching users' core traits and values to find a couple believed to be compatible for a long-lasting relationship. Originally, prospective members of the site would complete a proprietary questionnaire to determine their profile; the questionnaire was later made optional. From its launch in 2000 to 2010, eHarmony had around 33 million members. In 2009, its cumulative revenue surpassed $1 billion. While the site did not originally offer same-sex matches, a separate site, called Compatible Partners, was launched to provide service to the LGBTQ+ community. That site eventually merged with eHarmony.

After retiring in 2007, Warren returned to eHarmony in 2012 as the company's CEO. He proceeded to close international operations that had lost profits, switch advertisers, and make many changes to the board. Warren also purchased bad stock from Technology Crossover Ventures and Sequoia Capital. In 2016, he left the company for the second time. The following year, eHarmony reportedly had 750,000 paid members and 10 million users, numbers that held steady with those reported in 2012. In 2018, the site was purchased by the German mass media company ProSiebenSat.1 via its NuCom division.

(Photo by Gary Friedman/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)

Books

Warren has authored a number of books, most of them focused on helping people find compatible spouses. Titles include "Finding Contentment"; "Finding the Love of Your Life"; "Catching the Rhythm of Love"; "Falling in Love for All the Right Reasons"; "How to Know if Someone is Worth Pursuing in Two Dates or Less"; and "The Triumphant Marriage." Warren has also written dozens of articles for various publications, including the Huffington Post.

Religious Conflicts

Warren's religious views have often come into conflict with his business efforts. As a conservative Christian, he opposes same-sex marriage, which was why eHarmony did not originally offer same-sex matches. However, Warren realized he could not jeopardize major markets by discriminating against potential members, leading to the creation of the LGBTQ-friendly platform Compatible Partners.

Personal Life

Warren has been married to his wife Marylyn since 1959. They have three daughters named Lorraine, Marylyn, and Lindsay, plus nine grandchildren. The couple resides in Southern California.

Kennebunkport Mansion

In Kennebunkport, Maine, Neil commissioned a 14,000 square foot family compound set on 30 acres directly across from the famous Bush family compound. Construction was completed in 2007. When not at the mansion, the Warrens make it available for rent for as much as $140,000 per month during the summer. Here is a video tour:

Read more: Neil Clark Warren Net Worth