The Millionaires listed below built their fortunes through programming, tech entrepreneurship, or deep knowledge of computers and software:
💻 Tech-Savvy Millionaires & Billionaires
1. Elon Musk
- Background: This guy originally from South Africa taught himself programming at a young age.
- First success: Sold a video game code at 12, later co-founded Zip2 and PayPal.
- Tech Focus: Tesla, SpaceX, Neuralink, OpenAI (co-founder).
2. Bill Gates
- Background: Started programming in high school.
- Success: Co-founded Microsoft; created MS-DOS, Windows.
- Tech Skills: Strong programming foundation; dropped out of Harvard to pursue tech.
3. Mark Zuckerberg
- Background: Built games and tools in middle school; studied CS at Harvard.
- Success: Created Facebook in his dorm room.
- Tech Skills: Strong coder; wrote the original Facebook prototype himself.
4. Larry Page & Sergey Brin
- Background: Both studied computer science at Stanford.
- Success: Co-founded Google; Page created PageRank, the foundation of Google search.
- Tech Skills: Deep knowledge in algorithms, search, AI.
5. Vitalik Buterin
- Background: Math prodigy, skilled in coding from a young age.
- Success: Co-founded Ethereum, a leading blockchain platform.
- Tech Skills: Created smart contracts concept and Ethereum’s architecture.
6. Linus Torvalds
- Background: Finnish software engineer.
- Success: Created the Linux operating system kernel.
- Tech Skills: Hardcore programmer; admired in open-source communities.
7. Jeff Bezos
- Background: Studied electrical engineering and CS at Princeton.
- Success: Founded Amazon as an online bookstore; scaled it into a tech giant.
- Tech Skills: Early work in fintech, very technical during Amazon’s start.
8. Palmer Luckey
- Background: Built VR headsets in his garage as a teenager.
- Success: Founded Oculus VR, sold to Facebook for $2 billion.
- Tech Skills: Deep understanding of VR hardware/software.
9. Patrick & John Collison
- Background: Self-taught programmers from Ireland.
- Success: Founded Stripe, a major payment processor.
- Tech Skills: Known for coding speed and elegance.
10. Kevin Systrom
- Background: Studied management science and engineering at Stanford.
- Success: Built Instagram from scratch, sold to Facebook.
- Tech Skills: Built the app and backend himself in early days.