Top 10 richest people in the UK

Summary

• Inventor and entrepreneur, Sir James Dyson is the UK’s richest person as he added £3.6 billion to his wealth over the past year to a total of £16.2 billion.
• The Hinduja brothers scaled down to second place with a decline of £6 billion in their fortune since the last year 2019.
• The UK has around 25 female billionaires who run several popular businesses. Kirsten Rausing is ranked at number six and Charlene de Carvalho of Heineken is at number nine.

In the times of the coronavirus pandemic, we wake up every day to the reports of new losses in businesses, market turmoil, job cuts, etc. But today, we bring something to cheer for by talking about wealth and affluence-stories of creation of riches and draw inspirations from. Till November 2019, the UK had more than 50 billionaires who built their fortune across a wide range of industries. Among these ‘Richie rich’, some of those who were ranked at top spots are the first generation Britishers who trace their origins to countries like India and Russia.

Yes, we are talking about the super-rich Britons, although the coronavirus pandemic has affected their business prospects as well. If recent estimates are correct, then Britain’s top 1000 richest people have lost more than £54 billion over the past few months. The total wealth of this segment has been reported to see a plunge in a long time, which was last seen during the 2008 financial crash. In comparison to the pre-pandemic times of 2019, there are losses of up to £6 billion for some billionaires.

Despite the disorders brought by Brexit in the recent past, the UK has not lost the status of a place to generate and grow wealth. One of the leading world economies, the UK has continued to build avenues of prosperity for aspiring business leaders. For 2020, inventor and entrepreneur, Sir James Dyson emerged as the richest person in the UK for the first time. Dyson added £3.6 billion to his wealth over the past year to a total of £16.2 billion. He had put £500 million of his own money for an electric car venture, which he lost as the project got shut. The fall in the fortune of Hinduja brothers with a loss of £6 billion since the year 2019 helped Dyson to replace them to reach the top rank. The Hinduja brothers scaled down their top slot to be at the second position. In 2020, the UK has around 25 female billionaires who run several popular businesses including Denise Coates of the gambling company Bet365 and Elisabeth Murdoch from the Murdoch family with interests in the media business.

Talking of cities housing the richest people, there are around 80 billionaires living in London in comparison to any other city in the world. London is followed by New York with 56 and Paris with 21 billionaires. San Francisco, Moscow, Hong Kong, and Los Angeles each have between 40 and 50 billionaires. The London numbers also comprises more than 80 per cent of all the UK billionaires.

Below we bring the list of top 10 richest people in the UK, their total worth, and discuss about how they made to their ranks.

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Number 10: The Duke of Westminster and the Grosvenor family

Total worth: £10.295 billion

Source of wealth: Property

The aristocrat, businessman and owner of the Grosvenor Group, Hugh Grosvenor is the youngest billionaire in the UK at the age of 29. He became the Seventh Duke of Westminster in 2016 after the death of his father Gerald Grosvenor. Grosvenor is considered to be the world's richest person aged under the age of 30.The family’s inherited land dates back to 1677 and the estate comprises of around 300 acres across west London that includes some of the costly areas like Belgravia and Mayfair.

Number 9: Charlene de Carvalho and Michel de Carvalho

Total worth: £10.3 billion

Source of wealth: Brewer, banking, and inheritance

Charlene de Carvalho, a Dutch-British businesswoman enjoys a controlling stake in Heineken International, the world’s second-largest brewer. Being the only child of Freddy Heineken, who died in 2002, she inherited the Dutch brewer company, worth £36.7 billion. She is married to Michel de Carvalho and lives in London and Switzerland.

Number 8: Guy George and Galen Jr Weston and family

Total worth: £10.53 billion

Source of wealth: Retail

Guy George comes from a business family that built popular brands like Selfridges and Primark. The coronavirus pandemic has hit the fashion chain financially, however George’s net worth is up by £30 million in 2020 when compared to the last year 2019. The Weston family also owns the UK-based Wittington Investments, which has a majority stake in AB Foods, the parent company for Primark. Wittington Investments also owns luxury retailers like Fortnum & Mason, Selfridges, and furniture retailer Heal’s.

Number 7: Alisher Usmanov

Total worth: £11.7billion

Source of wealth: Mining and investment

The Russian business tycoon, Alisher Usmanov aged 66, has interests both in mining and investment. His largest holding is Metalloinvest, an iron ore and steel company. One of the early investors to put money in the social media major, Facebook, has stakes in Twitter, apart from well-known brands like Alibaba, Airbnb, Uber and Spotify. Besides Xiaomi, the oligarch owns stakes in other telecom sector ventures, media, and mining entities. In 2018, Usmanov earned $700 million in cash by selling stake in the Arsenal Football Club.

Number 6: Kirsten and Jorn Rausing

Total worth: £12.1billion

Source of wealth: Inheritance and investment

Kirsten Rausing is an alternative director since 1986 and a non-executive director since 1991 of Tetra Laval.

Image courtesy: Tetra Laval website

Kirsten Rausing, 66, was born in Sweden and inherited the Swiss-based Tetra Laval, a company jointly built by her father and uncle and founded by her grandfather Ruben as Tetra Pak, the packaging giant. Rausing is the woman with highest net worth among the top 10 richest people.

Rausing owns Lanwades stud in Newmarket, home to 3 leading British stallions, where she bred many race horses, who won in the 2017 and 2018 Hong Kong Cup. Besides being a member of the Jockey Club, she has 50 per cent ownership in British Bloodstock Agency that buys and sells racehorses for wealthy clients

Number 5: Sir Jim Ratcliffe

Total worth: £12.15 billion

Source of wealth: Chemicals

Sir Jim Ratcliffe is the chairman of Ineos Group since 1998

Image courtesy: Ineos Group website

Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s worth saw a decline of around£6 billion from last year as his company, Ineos Group, required emergency loans from the British government. The London-based Ineos Group manufactures a wide range of products including synthetic oils, plastics, and solvents that are mainly used to make insulin and antibiotics. After entering the shale market in 2014, Ineos soon became one of the largest UK players in the sector. The company’s 600 foot gas carriers known as ‘Dragon Ships’ were among the pioneers to transport shale gas into Europe from the United States. Ratcliffe has signed a five-year sponsorship deal with Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One team.

Number 4: Sir Leonard Blavatnik

Total worth: £15.8 billion

Source of wealth: Investment

Sir Leonard Blavatnik founded Access Industries in 1986

Image courtesy: Access Industries website

Sir Leonard Blavatnik’s investment company Access Industries has stakes in several companies across the chemicals, e-commerce, and fashion labels. He has a plan to launch a streaming service in the UK called Dazn with focus on sports in the lines of Netflix. Already running in nine countries, this forms the global expansion strategy to create presence in over 200 countries. The British-American businessman, investor, and philanthropist, Sir Leonard Blavatnik, made his initial fortune in 2013 by selling his stake in the Russian oil company, TNK-BP for $ 7 billion. Prior to this in 2011, he bought Warner Music for $3.3 billion.

Number 3: David and Simon Reuben

Total worth: £16 billion

Source of wealth: Metal trading, technology, and property

Born in Mumbai, India, the two brothers grew up in the UK, David started with trading metals, while Simon was involved in carpet import business, besides real estate. In the 1990’s, the Reuben brother’s company into metals trading, Transworld, invested in Russia and Kazakhstan, besides trading aluminum. The brothers sold 49 per cent stake of their data centre company called Global Switch for approximately $3 billion in 2016 to a consortium of Chinese investors. Venturing for the first time into football, the brothers plan to buy a stake in the Premier League football club Newcastle United.

Number 2: Srichand and Gopichand Hinduja

Total worth: £16 billion

Source of wealth: Oil and gas, IT, energy, media, banking, property, and healthcare

The Hinduja brothers with Indian origin scaled down to second place from last year’s number one rank. The losses due to the coronavirus pandemic-led slowdown eroded a good chunk of their business value on the Indian stock market.

The Hinduja Group’s businesses spread across oil and gas, IT, energy, media, banking, property and healthcare. Among these, the oil business suffered tremendously with crude hitting negative territory earlier in 2020. Among the four siblings, Srichand and Gopichand live in London and have one of their homes in Carlton House Terrace, Buckingham Palace. The Old War Office building in Whitehall, London is also under the name of Hinduja brothers. While Prakash Hinduja stays in Monaco, the youngest brother, Ashok Hinduja looks after the Group’s business from Mumbai in India.

Number 1: Sir James Dyson

Total worth: £16.2 billion

Source of wealth: Household goods and technology

A self-made businessman and inventor, Sir James Dyson, 72, is well-known for his the invention of a bag-less vacuum cleaner that hit the market in 1993, accounting for a large portion of his wealth. The Britain's best-selling vacuum cleaner was a result of downsizing an industrial extractor for home usage. Having an academic background in designing, his earlier invention includes a wheelbarrow in 1974 which used a spherical wheel.

Dyson became the UK richest person by replacing Indian-born businessmen Srichand and Gopichand Hinduja. While majority of the Dyson products are designed in the UK, the manufacturing happens mostly in Asia. After moving production from Wiltshire to Malaysia, Dyson relocated his business headquarters as well to Singapore. Dyson backed the Brexit and said the UK would be in a better position when it comes out of the European Union.

Conclusion

Post the financial crisis of 2008, the UK’s wealthiest people have considerably added to their riches but the crisis due to coronavirus pandemic has already washed out millions of pounds from their wallets as economic activities were completely shut during the lockdown period. Though the economy has started to open up, the ongoing fight against the virus does not present a clear picture of prosperity. They may be envied but the country needs the jobs that these richest entrepreneurs create, the taxes that these richest businessmen pay to overcome a long-term economic downturn.