Carlos Slim Helu is a self-made Mexican billionaire who has become the world's richest person this year by pushing Bill Gates to second position. He started to make his mark by swooping the privatization of Mexico's national telecom company in 1990s. He has expanded his business portfolio from telecom to construction, energy infrastructure, banking and news media. Read More

Bill Gates is the co-founder of Microsoft which produces software products like Windows and Microsoft Office. He stepped down from the daily duties of Microsoft this year to concentrate on Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Windows 7 helped push the revenues of Microsoft north this year. Watch interview of Bill Gates on Charlie Rose

The world's most famous investor saw the growth of over $10 billion in his revenues inspite of the financial meltdown worldwide. Warren Buffett recently acquired railroad giant Burlington Northern Santa Fe for $26 billion. While most of the big-guns on Wall Street were begging Govt. to help pay their debts, Berkshire Hathaway's book value rose to 19.8% in the year 2009. Recommended reading: The Intelligent Investor

Mukesh Ambani is the richest Indian and owns India's most valuable company, Reliance Industries. The company has oil, gas and petrochemicals businesses and has recently ventured into the retail with a host of supermarket chains across India. He also owns the cricket team, Mumbai Indians in the Indian Premier League (IPL). Read More.

Lakshmi Mittal owns Arcelor Mittal which is world's biggest steelmaker. The past year was particularly hard for the steel business and the profts of Arcelor Mittal tumbled by 75%. Lakshmi Mittal made most of his wealth by buying loss-making small steel businesses across the world and turning them into profits. He owns Indian citizenship but lives in the London, UK. Read More.

Lawrence Ellison founded the database giant Oracle which performed well on Wall Street as it's share prices rose by 70% in last 12 months. It bought Sun Micrsosystems and BEA Systems for $7.4 billion and $8.5 billion respectively. Larry Ellison has a passion for big yachts and owns a 453-foot yacht Rising Sun with friend David Geffen. Recommended reading: Softwar: An Intimate Portrait of Larry Ellison and Oracle

Bernard Arnault is the richest man in France and owns some of the most famous luxury brands such as Lous Vitton, Christian Dior, Fendi, Kenzo and TAG Heuer. Bernard Arnault is a keen art collector and also owns auction houses. He also owns upscale real estate properties in Europe, USA and recently in China. Read More.

Eike Batista has added a whopping $19.5 billion in his wealth in the past one year. He is the president of Companhia Vale do Rio Doce which is one of the biggest mining companies in the world. He has made most of his wealth in the later years through OGX which is an oil and gas exploration company he founded in 2007. Read More.

Amancio Ortega owns Inditex which has host of fashion brands such as Zara, Massimo Dutti and Stradivarius. He also owns properties in Madrid, Paris, London and Lisbon alongside investments in gas, tourism and banking. He is a self-made billionaire who started by making dressing gowns and lingeries with the help of his wife in his living room. Read More.

Karl Albrecht owns the German discount-supermarket chain Aldi Sud which is one of the major grocers in Europe. There is very little information available in public domain about him. He along with his brother Theo started Aldi and split the company in 1961. Read More.

Ingvar Kamprad founded IKEA which sells flat pack furniture, accessories and bathroom and kitchen items when he was just 17 years old. The company has over 301 retail outlets in 37 countries and made the fiscal sales of $31 billion in year 2009. Recommended reading: Leading by design: The Ikea story

Christy Walton is the richest shareholder of Walmart. The retail giant has over 2 million workers with the annual sales of $405 billion. Inspite of the recession the share prices of the company rose 7% in the last 12 months. She lives in Jackson, Wyoming. Recommended reading: To Serve God and Wal-Mart

Stefan Persson is the chairman and main shareholder of Hennes and Mauritz (H&M), the fashion company founded by his father Erling Persson. The company hires big fasion designers to design affordable collections to be sold at its 1900 fashion outlets. Read More.

The high-school drop-out owing to the poor financial condition of the family is one of the world's richest Asians. Li Ka-Shing has come a long way from selling plastic flowers to now owning the world's largest container terminal, Hutchison Whampoa. The company has interests in telecom, real estate and retail as well. Read More.

Jim Walton is one of the four children of Sam Walton who founded the retail giant, Walmart. Jim runs family's Arvest Bank. Recommended reading: To Serve God and Wal-Mart

Alice Walton also inherited the huge wealth of her father Sam Walton along with her brothers and sisters who routinely make it to the world's richest people. Alice Walton has founded financial firms and actively participates in philanthropic efforts. Recommended reading: To Serve God and Wal-Mart

Liliane Bettencourt inherited the fortunes of cosmetics giant L'Orial, a company founded by her father Eugene Schueller. The company celebrated its 100 years in 2009. Liliane Bettencourt and the Swiss food company Nestle each control over a quarter of the shares and voting rights. Read More.

S. Robson Walton is the eldest son of Sam Walton and the chairman of Walmart. Rob took the mantle of the company two days after the death of his father and continues to do so even now. Recommended reading: To Serve God and Wal-Mart

The nephew of the king of Saudi Arabia saw his wealth increased by over $6 billion in the past year. He is the largest individual shareholder of Citibank and has large holdings in Four Seasons and Fairmont hotel management chains. He owns 4 airplanes including an Airbus A380. Watch the interview with Charlie Rose

David Thomson is the chairman of Thomson Reuters and holds significant holdings in news media, TV channels and radio stations. He owns CTVglobemedia which is the parent company of Canada'a national newspaper, The Globe and Mail.

Micheal Otto inherited the cintrol and wealth of Otto group which is a developer, manufacturer and supplier of waste-handling eqipment across the world. The company has investments in private equites, venture capital and real estate. Micheal Otto is also a collector of modern art.

Lee Shau Kee is a self-made Hong Kong billionaire who owns real-estate firm, Henderson Land Development. He also owns stakes in many Chinese companies such as PetroChina, China Shenhua Energy and China Life. Read More.

Micheal Bloomberg is the 8th richest man in USA as well as the current mayor of New York City. He started his entrepreunerial journey by creating financial information services firm Innovative Market Systems to sell financial data, analytic tools to Wall Street. Read More.

Sergey Brin is the cofounder of search engine giant, Google which makes over 90% of the revenues from online advertising. He was born in Moscow and his family emigrated to USA when he was six. Watch Biography - The Google Boys

Charles Koch is an American billionaire and the partial owner of Koch Industries which has stakes in pipelines, refineries, fertilizer, fibers and polymers, forest and consumer products, chemical technology. Read More.

David Koch is the brother of Charles Koch and owns 42% of Koch Industries along with Charles Koch who also owns the same share. David holds chemical engineering degree from MIT.

Larry Page is the cofounder of Google along with Sergey Brin. Google has the annual sales of $23.7 billion, majority of which comes from online advertising. The company is going stronger than ever in the web technology space with plans to launch netbooks based on it's Chrome Operating System. Watch Biography - The Google Boys

Michele Ferrero is the richest man in Italy, even surpassing the wealth of Silvio Berlusconi and owns privately held chocolate maker Ferrero SpA with chocolate brands like Ferrero Rocher, Nutella, Tic Tac and Kinder Eggs.

Kwok family is one of the richest real esate firms in Hong Kong. The company is about to finish the construction of the Hong Kong's tallest building, the Internatinal Commerce Centre. Family also owns stakes in telecom SmarTone-Vodafone and city bus operator KMB.

Azim Premji is the owner of sofware company, Wipro which is India's third largest software exporter after TCS and Infosys. Wipro was founded as a vegetable oil trading company by Azim Premji's father. Read More.

Theo Albrecht is the brother of Karl Albrecht and owns the rights to do business with brand Aldi in northern Germany and the Europe (except UK). Theo also owns stake in Supervalu.

Vladimir Lisin is the richest man in Russia and he started his career at the Tulachermet Metals Works as a foreman, rising through the ranks to become section manager and shop manager. He is the majority stakeholder in Russia's giant Novolipetsk steel.

Steven Ballmer was the 30th employee of Microsoft and he dropped out of Stanford MBA program when Bill Gates needed a Business graduate to manage Microsoft. Steve known for his bold or rather eccentric statements about competitors became CEO of Microsoft in 2000. Watch interview of Steven Ballmer on Charlie Rose

Robert Kuok is the richest man in Malaysia and has business interests ranging from shipping to real estate to media. He once controlled 10% of world's sugarcane production which gave him nickname, "Sugar King of Asia".

George Soros is America's wealthiest hedge fund manager. He is a shrewd investor and became to be known as "the Man Who Broke the Bank of England" after he made a reported $1 billion on one day when Bank of England stopped fixing exchange rate. He is an active philanthropist now. Recommended reading: The Soros Lectures

Anil Ambani is the younger brother of Mukesh Ambani and their mother parted the business empire made by their father between the two. Anil has interests in telecom, power, infrastructure, financial services and entertainment. Read More.

Paul Allen is the cofounder of Microsoft along with Bill Gates. He is also the owner of Seattle Seahawks american football team and Portland Trailblazers basketball team. He is a philanthropist diagnosed with lymphoma; undergoing chemotherapy treatment.

Micheal Dell is the founder of Dell which is world's largest PC maker. The company's revenues have shrinked in later years owing to more competition. He also looks after Michael & Susan Dell Foundation which funds education and childhood health. Recommended reading: Direct from Dell - Strategies that Revolutionized an Industry

Mikhail Prokhorov is a self-made Russian billionaire entrepreneur who made his name in the financial sector and went on to become one of Russia's leading industrialists in the precious metals sector. He now owns Russia's largest gold producer, Polyus Gold. Watch 60 Minutes - The Russian is Coming

Birgit Rausing, born 1924, is a Swedish art historian and philanthropist. After death of her husband Gad Rausing in 2000, with her 3 children, inherited packaging giant Tetra Laval. In 1944 her father-in-law founded Tetra Pak, which revolutionized the packaging of liquids such as juices and milk. Read More.

Shashi and Ravi Ruia own Essar Group which is a multinational conglomerate in the sectors of Steel, Energy, Power, Communications, Shipping Ports & Logistics as well as Construction based in Mumbai. Essar Steel is India's largest exporter of flat steel.

Mikhail Friedman cofounded the Alfa Group Consortium, a holding company which today controls Alfa Bank, Alfa Capital, Tyumen Oil and several construction material firms as well as food processing businesses and a supermarket chain.

Jeff Bezos is the founder of Amazon.com which he started at the age of 30. He worked as a financial analyst for D. E. Shaw & Co. before founding Amazon in 1994. He is one of the few dotcom entrepreuners who survived the dotcom boom. Watch Jeff Bezos interview on Charlie Rose

Savitri Jindal is India's richest woman and the non-executive chairperson of Jindal Steel. She became the chairperson after her husband, O.P. Jindal, died in a helicopter crash in 2005.

Donald L. Bren is an American real estate mogul and chairman of the Irvine Company. He owns 475 office buildings, 115 apartment communities, 41 retail centers, resort properties, new housing communities in Orange County, San Diego, Los Angeles, Silicon Valley.

Gerald Cavendish Grosvenor is the richest property developer in Britain and one of Britain's largest landowners, owning vast estates in Lancashire, Cheshire and Scotland as well as great swathes of Mayfair and Belgravia in central London.

John Paulson is a hedge fund manager who pocketed $3.5 billion by betting against the mortgage crisis. Paulson began his career at Boston Consulting Group before leaving to join Odyssey Partners, working under Leon Levy and he founded his own hedge fund with $2 million and two employees in 1994. Read More: The Behind-the-Scenes Story of How John Paulson Defied Wall Street and Made Financial History

Abigail Johnson is President of Fidelity Investments Personal and Workplace Investing and the daughter of Edward Jhonson who owns Fidelity which is America's largest mutual fund company.

Jorge Paulo Lemann is the third wealthiest individual in Brazil. He founded an investmant bank called Garantia. Later, he bought control of a Brazilian brewery that eventually became AmBev. He is now one of the largest shareholders of Anheuser-Busch Inbev, the world's biggest brewer.

Roman Abramovich is a Russian businessman and the main owner of the private investment company Millhouse LLC. Abramovich made fortune in a series of controversial oil export deals in early 1990s. He is also the owner of Chelsea Football Club. Read More: Abramovich: The Billionaire from Nowhere