As of March 2025, Elon Musk, the CEO of SpaceX, Tesla, and X (previously known as Twitter), was the richest person in the global tech industry with an estimated net worth of 312 billion U.S. dollars. Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, followed with a net worth of 217 billion U.S. dollars. Elon Musk and Twitter/X On October 27th, 2022, Elon Musk bought the social network Twitter for around 44 billion U.S. dollars and became its CEO. Since Musk’s acquisition, the company has experienced some adjustments, including a name change to X and the option for users of becoming verified members for eight U.S. dollars per month. Moreover, there has been reports of increasing hate speech and the platform after Musk's takeover. Other tech billionaires and their companies Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft ranked 5th. Today, Microsoft develops consumer and enterprise software, services, and consumer electronics. In its 2023 financial year, Microsoft generated revenues of just under 212 billion U.S. dollars. By contrast, Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Meta, ranked third. The company, previously known as Facebook, was rebranded in 2021 and its products include Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, and WhatsApp. Despite their wealth, these companies are not immune to the layoffs that have plagued the tech industry, which are affecting Meta and Amazon employees the most.

As of September 2023, Amazon's founder Jeff Bezos was the world's richest internet billionaire, with an estimated net worth of 114 billion U.S. dollars. The chief technology officer of the computer software company Oracle, Larry Ellison, ranked second, with a fortune of 107 billion U.S. dollars. Bill Gates, the co-founder of tech giant Microsoft, ranked third in the ranking of internet billionaires, with a net worth of 104 billion U.S. dollars.

Bright future for tech industry

Standing out as one of the most profitable and fastest-growing industries, the tech sector's future looks bright as global spend is forecasted to rise annually until at least 2023, hitting nearly 4.6 trillion U.S. dollars that year. Most of this will come from investment in communication services, followed by IT services. In the aftermath of the global coronavirus pandemic, the software industry was also one of the more resilient tech branches, with approximately 6.6 percent growth forecast in October 2021, second only to the PC/Tablet category.

Amazon and Alphabet are top market players

In the realm of software, Amazon and Alphabet currently top the list of largest internet companies in the world by market capitalization. Starting in 1994 as an online bookstore, the internet giant founded by Jeff Bezos has since grown to offer grocery services, media streaming, e-books and smart home technology, among other products, and is now a leading e-commerce platform worldwide. Meanwhile, Alphabet, the Google brand's parent company, has also risen to be one of the most prominent players on the internet, primarily due partly to noteworthy acquisitions such as YouTube and the Android operating system, which now powers over 70 percent of the world's mobile devices.

The impressive growth of social media companies in the early 2010s made many founders extremely wealthy. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is the world’s richest social media entrepreneur with a personal net worth of *** billion U.S. dollars. Zhang Yiming, the creator of TikTok, is worth **** billion U.S. dollars. Social media companies going public and being acquired The years between 2010 and 2019 saw a flurry of social media companies filing for an initial public offering (IPO) or being acquired by bigger, public companies, generating significant amounts of wealth for their founders and early employees in the process. Facebook, which went public in May 2012, had the biggest IPO in tech and internet history until online shopping giant Alibaba went public in 2014. Many of the richest social media entrepreneurs are connected to Facebook and most of their net worth is derived from their early investment and subsequent ownership stake in the social network. Many early Facebook investors and co-founders have used their earnings from the company to increase their wealth derived from tech. Some, such as Dustin Moskovitz, have gone on to found other companies, whereas others, like Eduardo Saverin, have become venture capitalists. The social media era Other social media company IPOs which created major online buzz include Twitter’s in 2013, Snap’s initial public offering four years later and more recently, Pinterest’s, which made headlines in early 2019. TikTok's founder Zhang Yiming saw an unprecedented success in 2020 and ranked second on the social media billionaires' list. The coronavirus social restrictions and lockdowns led to people resorting to TikTok as a means of entertainment and socializing. Instagram founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger netted a huge payday in 2012 when Facebook bought their then up-and-coming social network Instagram for * billion U.S. dollars – a sum which at that time was unheard of for such a transaction. However, this is nothing compared to the payout enjoyed by Jan Koum and Brian Acton two years later, whose chat service WhatsApp was acquired by Facebook for a staggering ** billion U.S. dollars – although the Facebook-Instagram deal arguably made bigger waves across the industry. In hindsight, Facebook’s acquisition of Instagram has come to represent a turning point in tech venture capitalism, helping to define the concept of tech “unicorns” and positioning an acquisition-enabled exit as a viable and lucrative target for start-ups.

Introduction

Millionaire Statistics: A growing number of individuals are becoming millionaires across the globe due to economic growth, an increase in stock markets, and entrepreneurial ventures. Studies show that by the year 2024, the population of millionaires and born and bred individuals across the globe will still grow due to the growing concentration of wealth in certain areas and sectors.

An analysis of the statistics on millionaires paints a clear picture of how wealth is being shared among the general populace and the levels of economic oppression in existence, as well as financial matters in the international arena.

This piece demonstrates the situational picture of millionaire statistics in the world, their wealth, their geographical distribution, and projections of their population in the years to come.

As of April 2025, Elon Musk was estimated as the wealthiest person in the United States with a net worth of around 342 billion dollars. Richest people in the United States - additional information Every year since 1982, the American business magazine Forbes has been compiling lists of the 400 richest people in the United States, known as the “Forbes 400.” In addition to that, since 1987, the publication has also been compiling a ranking of the 500 richest people in the world (excluding royalty and dictators), as well as more specialized tops, such as “World's Most Powerful Women,” “America's Richest Families,” “Most Valuable Brands” or “30 Under 30,” which focuses on young entrepreneurs from various fields which have gained millions in the past year by the use of social media, technical innovations and generally new and fresh approaches to business.

As of August 2024, the executive chairman of Samsung Electronics Lee Jae-yong (Jay Y. Lee) was the wealthiest person in South Korea, with a net worth of about 11.5 billion U.S. dollars. His net worth increased from 7.9 billion U.S. dollars from the previous year when he rose from second to first place. Seo Jung-jin, the co-founder of Celltrion, followed with about 7.3 billion dollars. Turbulent times for the wealthy Despite the country's economic recovery from the impact of COVID-19, South Korea’s wealthiest people lost a significant amount of their net worth because of the poorly performing stock market and a weakened currency. Lee Jae-yong overcame the shrinking demand for tech goods and ranked as the wealthiest South Korean, although his net worth the year before was more than one billion dollars higher. The founder of Kakao, Kim Beom-su, had the same net worth as Lee Jae-yong in 2022. However, he only placed fourth in 2023, losing more than four billion dollars in net worth within the year. In October 2022, Kakao faced public outrage and criticism because of a service outage. Conglomerates’ dominating position in the South Korean economy   Although the collective wealth of the 50 wealthiest people in South Korea fell by about 18 percent, conglomerates dominated the market. Samsung Electronics had the highest market capitalization among business groups listed in South Korea, amounting to about 474 trillion South Korean won. The position of the largest businesses represented a significant hurdle for start-ups. South Korea had a low survival rate for new companies compared to the OECD average, discouraging the emergence of new businesses. When asked about the most critical challenges, small- and medium-sized business owners answered that increasing revenue and attracting customers were the most difficult.

According to a 2022 survey conducted in the United States, almost one-quarter of Twitter users strongly approved of Tech-billionaire Elon Musk buying social media platform Twitter, whilst one in four Twitter users somewhat approved. Around one-quarter of Twitter users in the U.S. strongly disapproved of Musk's taking over Twitter, a marginal increase since being asked the same question in April 2022 when Musk first announced he was buying the company.

According to a survey conducted in May 2022, 23 percent of adults in the United States would probably not continue to use a social media platform if the owner was known to make rash decisions. Only eight percent of respondents stated that they were definitely willing to continue using a social media platform in such a situation. The scenario has come up due to tech billionaire Elon Musk's interest in buying social media platform Twitter.

On October 27th, 2022, tech-billionaire Elon Musk acquired Twitter, assigning himself the role of the company's new CEO. Between September 27th and November 28th, mentions of right-wing accounts in anti-LGBTQ tweets increased. The Twitter account Libs of TikTok saw an increase in mentions of anti-LGBTQ tweets from two thousand to almost 14 thousand. Congresswoman Mayra Flores saw a 5,952 percent increase in mentions in anti-LGBTQ tweets, whilst Donald Trump Jr. saw a 290 percent increase in mentions.

According to an online survey conducted in the United States in May 2022, 26 percent of respondents who earned between 50,000 and 100,000 U.S. dollars per year had a somewhat favorable impression of tech billionaire Elon Musk. Overall, 31 percent of those earning over 100,000 U.S. dollars annually held the same opinion. Furthermore, 27 percent of respondents who had an annual income of under 50,000 U.S. dollars said they had heard of Musk, but had no opinion of him. Elon Musk is the CEO of Tesla Motors and SpaceX and has recently made moves to acquire social network company Twitter.

Twitter UK's profit before tax in 2021 stood at just over six million British pounds. In 2022, the well-known micro-blogging service was bought and rebranded to X by tech-billionaire Elon Musk.

In May 2022, an online survey in the United States found that men were more likely to have a favorable impression of tech billionaire Elon Musk than women. Overall, more than two in ten male respondents said they had a very favorable impression of Musk, compared to 10 percent of women. Additionally, 27 percent of women said they had heard of Musk, but held no opinion of him. Elon Musk is the CEO of Tesla Motors and SpaceX and has recently been making moves to acquire social network company Twitter.

According to an online survey conducted in May 2022, the majority of respondents across all generations had a somewhat favorable impression of tech billionaire Elon Musk. Overall, 14 percent of Millennials had a very favorable view of Musk, as did 14 percent of those belonging to the Baby boomer generation. Gen Z respondents were the most likely to have a very unfavorable impression of the Tesla and SpaceX CEO, who recently made moves to acquire social network company Twitter.

Between April 4th and May 16th, 2022, the Heard-Depp trial had an average of 508 social media interactions per article published. For the measured period, articles surrounding tech-billionaire Elon Musk totaled an average of 417 social media interactions. Overall, social media likes, comments, and shares on articles about abortion, the Russia Ukraine war, and COVID-19 had all been overshadowed by the Heard-Depp trial and Musk's Twitter take-over.

In the first quarter of 2025, Meta's net income amounted to 16.6 billion U.S. dollars, down from 20.8 billion when compared to the previous quarter.Facebook company informationFacebook is the biggest social network worldwide. The platform generates the vast majority of its revenues through advertising – as of March 2020, 98 percent of Facebook’s revenues were derived from ad sales, making the company highly dependent on market regulations regarding digital ad sales. In 2019, Facebook was second only to Google in terms of digital advertising revenues. The company’s ad revenue during this period amounted to 69.7 billion U.S. dollars. Facebook is still among the fastest-growing tech companies in the world. In 2020, the company increased its revenue by 21.6 percent compared to the previous year. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg also ranks among the richest internet billionaires with a personal net worth of roughly 97 billion U.S. dollars.