Business Insider India has updated its Privacy and Cookie policy. We use cookies to ensure that we give you the better experience on our website. If you continue without changing your settings, we\'ll assume that you are happy to receive all cookies on the Business Insider India website. However, you can change your cookie setting at any time by clicking on our Cookie Policy at any time. You can also see our Privacy Policy.
For some, it was another very good year in the elite club. But the personal wealth of others took a battering, not least Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who fell down the ranking after a disastrous year for his social network.
Complimentary Tech Event
Transform talent with learning that works
Capability development is critical for businesses who want to push the envelope of innovation.Discover how business leaders are strategizing around building talent capabilities and empowering employee transformation.Know More
Scroll on to see the world's 13 richest tech billionaires, ranked in ascending order.
It was a wild year for the Tesla CEO, with numerous scandals and Tesla's stock zooming up and down in tune with his erratic behaviour. Both Tesla and his rocket company SpaceX laid off significant chunks of their staff in January of this year. Musk remains lavishly wealthy, however.
11. Azim Premji. Net worth: $22.6 billion
Premji, sometimes referred to as the "Bill Gates of India" is the founder of IT company Wipro.
10. Michael Dell. Net worth: $34.3 billion
The CEO of Dell Technologies, most of Michael Dell's fortune is tied up in his private investment firm MSD Capital, according to Forbes.
9. Jack Ma. Net worth: $37.3 billion
Ma is the richest man in China. He announced in September 2018 that in one year he would step down as the chairman of Alibaba — the largest e-commerce site in China — and be succeeded by CEO Daniel Zhang.
8. Ma Huateng. Net worth: $38.8 billion
Ma is chair of the Chinese tech giant Tencent. Tencent owns messenger service Wechat, which is more or less ubiquitous in China.
Google cofounder and current president of Google's parent company Alphabet, Sergey Brin, still takes an active role in company all-hands meetings, according to reports which surfaced last year.
5. Larry Page. Net worth: $50.8 billion
Larry Page, the other Google cofounder, outranks Sergey Brin by a narrow $1 billion.
4. Mark Zuckerberg. Net worth: $62.3 billion
Facebook's year of scandal took a toll on CEO Mark Zuckerberg's fortune. It sunk nearly $9 billion since last year and he fell three places down the ranking. He was also usurped as the youngest self-made billionaire this year by Kylie Jenner.
Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates remains a board member at the company, but Forbes notes that he has sold or given away much of his stock, and owns just over 1% of shares.
Known for his philanthropy, Forbes reports that Gates has donated $35.8 billion worth of Microsoft stock to his charitable organization, the Gates Foundation.
1. Jeff Bezos. Net worth: $131 billion
At the top of the list sits Amazon CEO, owner of the Washington Post, and richest man in the world, Jeff Bezos.
Bezos was recently caught up in a firestorm after he announced his divorce from wife MacKenzie and texts from him to his reported lover Lauren Sanchez were leaked to the National Enquirer.
Bezos mounted his own investigation into how the paper got hold of the texts, and subsequently published a blog claiming that the Enquirer was blackmailing him with sensitive photographs.