World's 15 Richest Techies Of 2014

Show Me The Money

Wealth-watcher Forbes ranked Bill Gates, with a net worth of $76 billion, as the world's richest person as part of its latest roundup of billionaires, revealed Monday. According to Forbes, the number of billionaires around the world is up from last year from 1,426 to 1,645, and it was a record year for women to join the club, with 172 women making the list in 2014 compared with 138 a year earlier.

Tech made a lot of people rich this year, according to Forbes, with some new additions to the list, including the CEOs of Dropbox and WhatsApp. The list also saw big gains from billionaires such as Mark Zuckerberg, who more than doubled his net worth over the past year to $28.5 billion.

Here is a list of Forbes' top 15 richest techies on the planet.

15. Shiv Nadar

Native of India, Shiv Nadar made much of his fortune from his software flagship HCL Technologies that counts Boeing, Microsoft, Cisco and UBS as customers. According to Forbes, today Nadar spends little time running his software company and more time giving his money away via various philanthropic efforts.

Forbes Rank: 102
Worth: $11.1 billion

14. Robin Li
The 45-year-old founder and CEO of Baidu, Robin Li runs China's No. 1 search engine. He is the third richest man in mainland China, according to Forbes. Baidu is China's largest search engine.

Forbes Rank: 91
Worth: $12.1 billion

13. Ma Huateng
Ma Huateng is CEO and founder of China's most popular online games site Tencent Holdings. He is credited with creating the messaging tool Tencent QQ and being China's equivalent to AOL. Forbes ranks him as mainland China's second richest citizen.

Forbes Rank: 80
Worth: $13.4 billion

12. Laurene Powell Jobs & family
One of the few women techies on Forbes 400 list, Laurene Powell Jobs, age 50, is the widow of Steve Jobs. She is president of the board of College Track, founder and chair of the Emerson Collective and, notably, owns a 7.3 percent stake in the Walt Disney Co.

Forbes Rank: 73
Worth: $14 billion

11. Charles Ergen
Former President and CEO of Dish Network Charles Ergen, 60, is the co-founder and current chairman of the board, and former president and CEO of the Dish Network.

Forbes Rank: 65
Worth: $15 billion

10. Azim Premji

Azim Premji, 68, is India's richest techie and earned his fortunes running Wipro Limited, an IT consulting and outsourcing service company based in Bangalore, India. Premji's personal wealth grew significantly over the year when Wipro spun off its non-IT business to Wipro Enterprises that sold consumer care, lighting, and health-care products.

Forbes Rank: 61
Worth: $15.3 billion

9. Paul Allen
At age 60, Paul Allen is co-founder of Microsoft. His is also founder and chairman of Vulcan, which manages his venture capital business and philanthropic efforts.

Forbes Rank: 56
Worth: $15.9 billion

8. Michael Dell
Michael Dell is 49 years old and is founder, chairman and CEO of the newly private Dell. He recently ponied up a significant amount of his own personal wealth to buy back Dell and take an estimated 75 percent ownership stake in the company.

Forbes Rank: 48
Worth: $17.5 billion

7. Steve Ballmer
Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, 57, retired recently. The boisterous leader of Microsoft was the company's 30th employee -- hired in 1980.

Forbes Rank: 36
Worth: $19.3 billion

6. Mark Zuckerberg

Still in his 20s, Mark Zuckerberg, 29, is the third youngest to make Forbes list of billionaires. The co-founder and CEO of Facebook's net worth jumped in the past 12 months, landing him on the 21st spot on Forbes' list, up from No. 36 in 2012, thanks in large part to doubling the company's shares in the past year. Zuckerberg is no longer the youngest on the Forbes list. That distinction goes to 24-year-old Perenna Kei, who owns an 85 percent stake in her family's Logan Property Holdings company.

Forbes Rank: 21
Worth: $28.5 billion

5. Sergey Brin

Forty-year-old Sergey Brin leaves the day-to-day management of Google to Larry Page. Meanwhile Brin is the company's No. 1 promoter of Google Glass and spends his days running the company's top-secret Google X division, developing balloon-based Internet services and driverless cars.

Forbes Rank: 19
Worth: $31.8 billion

4. Jeff Bezos

Jeff Bezos, 50, is founder and CEO of Amazon. As Forbes points out, the billionaire has been on a shopping spree recently, paying $250 million for The Washington Post.

Forbes Rank: 18
Worth: $32 billion

3. Larry Page
Google co-founder and CEO Larry Page, age 40, has a net worth just $300 million more than his business partner Sergey Brin. Page and Brin have come a long way from the day they received their first $100,000 investment from Andy Bechtolsheim which they both celebrated by having breakfast at Burger King, according the book "In The Plex," by Steven Levy.

Forbes Rank: 17
Worth: $32.3 billion

2. Larry Ellison
Co-founder and CEO of Oracle and a software tycoon, Larry Ellison, 69, is the fifth richest individual on the planet, according to Forbes. When Ellison isn't running his software empire or trying to win the America's Cup sailing race, his official bio on Oracle.com, says he likes to flies planes, and plays tennis and guitar.

Forbes Rank: 5
Worth: $48 billion

1. Bill Gates
Gates took a four-year hiatus from the Forbes world’s richest list, but he is back. Gates, 58, reclaims the title from Mexican telecom mogul Carlos Slim Helu, who held the title since Gates had slipped. Over the past several years, Gates has given away $28 billion of his own personal wealth to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Forbes Rank: 1
Worth: $76 billion