Photo: AP At an age when most children learn division, Ernesto Bertarelli studied the pharmaceutical business.
His father, head of the drug-making company Serono, took his son to company meetings and industry conferences starting when he was just seven years old. It would have been stifling pressure for most young children, but Bertarelli found freedom on the nearby Italian Mediterranean. “I remember feeling surprised that my father, who wouldn’t let me drive a moped, would allow me to take a dinghy out alone at sea,” says Bertarelli, who is now worth $10.3 billion thanks to the success and eventual sale of Serono. Exit the dinghy. Like many of his fellow billionaires, those riches have allowed him to indulge his passion on a scale few can dream of. Bertarelli now owns one of the world’s great sailing teams, Alinghi, which captured the last two America’s Cups at a likely cost of more than $100 million per campaign. He hopes to capture a third trophy at sailing’s most prestigious event if he can settle disagreements with the team of fellow billionaire Larry Ellison. For bond-trading whiz Bill Gross, stamps are the thing. “Being a bond investor, I wanted it to be a hobby, but a successful one,” Gross said in 2006. It’s safe to say it’s worked out. The value of rare stamps appreciated considerably over the past decade. Now Gross is putting his valuable collection to good use, auctioning rare pieces and donating the proceeds to charity. Fashion designer Ralph Lauren owns some of the world’s rarest vehicles, including a 1929 Blower Bentley and a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO. Many of his cars could fetch over $1 million at an auction. The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston dedicated an entire exhibit to his collection once. To oversee his sizable collection of automotive rarities, Lauren employs a personal automobile curator.
Francois Pinault is worth $16.9 billion thanks to his majority stake in the luxury goods group PPR, a stable of high-end brands like Gucci, Balenciaga and Stella McCartney. He is also one of the world’s great art collectors.