Bharat Desai is the wealthiest Indian American.
By The American Bazaar Staff
WASHINGTON, DC: Five Indian Americans are among the Forbes list of 400 richest people in the US, with Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates topping it.
Bharat Desai, the founder (along with his wife Neerja Sethi) of the outsourcing firm Syntel; serial entrepreneur John Kapoor, who has founded Akorn Pharmaceuticals and INSYS Therapeutics; Symphony Technology founder Romesh Wadhwani; Silicon Valley angel investor Kavitark Ram Shriram and venture capitalist Vinod Khosla are among ‘The Richest People in America 2014’ list.
Desai and his family are the richest Indian Americans on the Forbes list. They rank 255 on the list, followed in order of wealth, by Kapoor (261), Wadhwani (264), Shriram (350) and Khosla (381).
The Forbes report said 2014 was another record year for American wealth. The aggregate net worth of the richest 400 Americans was $2.29 trillion, up $270 billion from a year ago.
“Thanks to a buoyant stock market, the richest people in the US just keep getting richer,” Forbes said.
Gates is the richest American for the 21st year in a row, with a net worth of $81 billion. Warren Buffett, chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway, is at the number two spot, a rank he has held since 2001, with a net worth of $67 billion.
Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg is at the 11th spot. His fortune soared to $34 billion, up $15 billion since last year, due to a sharp rise in the price of the social network’s shares.