George Roberts
Category: Billionaires
Company: Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co.
Industry: Finance
What Makes Him Haute: Roberts is one of the three original partners of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts Company, where he amassed a net worth that ranks him amongst the wealthiest in the world. In 1989, Roberts led one of the most famous leverage buyouts in the takeover of RJR Nabisco. His involvement in the deal was profiled in the novel and movie Barbarians at the Gate.
Diane Rubin
Category: Entrepreneurs
Company: Novogradac & Co.
Industry: Accounting
What Makes Her Haute: She’s tireless. Not only is she the only female partner in the San Francisco office of her firm, she has been named one of the top 100 most influential accountants in America. The devoted wife and mother runs marathons and hikes mountains for kicks, and she also donates her time to worthy institutions, such as the Opera Guild, where she serves as the director of the Executive Committee.
Chris Sacca
Category: Entrepreneurs
Company: Lowercase Capital
Industry: Venture Capitalism
What Makes Him Haute: He was one of the first investors in Twitter. He also had a pretty nice role at Google as head of special initiatives, where he oversaw projects like creating citywide WiFi access in Mountain View, California. He left Google to launch his venture capital firm, and, based on his first bet in Twitter, he has the ability to back some winners.
Sheryl Sandberg
Category: Entrepreneurs
Company: Facebook
Industry: Technology
What Makes Her Haute: Sandberg is COO of Facebook, where she works tirelessly to help the free social networking site turn a hefty profit. She has the experience to do so; prior to her current position, she was at Google, where she built the AdWords program. She also helped launch Google’s philanthropic arm, Google.org.
Jerry Sanders III
Category: Entrepreneurs
Company: Advanced Micro Devices
Industry: Technology
What Makes Him Haute: A champion of competition, Sanders, as co-founder and CEO of semiconductor manufacturer AMD, created the only real competitor to Intel. Before he stepped aside in 2002, for three-plus decades, he refused to back down despite odds and market share being stacked against him, allowing AMD to thrive while thousands of firms ended up in the tech graveyard. When IBM decided to not market desktops based on its own processors for Windows, AMD stayed. When Compaq and HP stopped making processors, AMD kept plugging away. While Motorola at times seems unsure in its commitment to desktop and server platforms, it was never a question for AMD. During the dot-com boom, when Intel suffered from supply problems, AMD grew market share from single digits to almost 20 percent.
Carlos Santana
Category: Entertainers
Company: Milagro Foundation
Industry: Music
What Makes Him Haute: He is an enduring musical legend with a career than spans decades. He got his start in San Francisco, and, while he is currently holding residency at the new Joint at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, his Milagro Foundation, dedicated to making a difference in the lives of children, is based in San Rafael.
Eric Schmidt
Category: Billionaires
Company: Google
Industry: Technology
What Makes Him Haute: Schmidt was brought on board at Google in 2001, and he took the company public in 2004. The Google tri-chief oversees an agenda that continues to wield influence in the tech industry and rake in the dough. It’s moved into new markets (and into more direct competition with Microsoft) with the launch of a mobile phone operating system and an open source web browser. Schmidt’s also been busy integrating acquisitions into Google, such as YouTube. He currently sits on the board of trustees for Carnegie Mellon University and Princeton University, and is a member President Obama’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.
Charles Schwab
Category: Billionaires
Company: Charles Schwab
Industry: Finance
What Makes Him Haute: The man who famously brought Wall Street back to Main Street by undercutting the big brokerage houses in the late 1970s was also one of the first to bring investing online (on CompuServe, well before the 90s Internet trading frenzy). Today, Charles Schwab & Co. holds close to $1.2 trillion of client assets (the figure fluctuates as wildly as the market) and a $25 billion bank that stayed clear of the toxic debt that has choke-slammed so many other financial institutions, and Chuck himself is a multibillionaire.
Gary Shansby
Category: Entrepreneurs
Company: Partida Tequila
Industry: Venture Capitalists
What Makes Him Haute: He’s a private-equity-firm investor turned tequila entrepreneur who happens to have the priciest home on the market in Sonoma—a 362-acre spread that features a stunning 11,600-square-foot, Tuscan-style villa on a hilltop. He bought the completely undeveloped property in 1990 for a little more than $5 million, and transformed it into a lavish estate that boasts a pool, spa, a 10-acre vineyard with Syrah grapes, a two-bedroom guesthouse, and horse stables. It all can be yours for a mere $35 million.
Walter Shorenstein
Category: Billionaires
Company: Shorenstein
Industry: Real Estate
What Makes Him Haute: The self-made billionaire got his start in the real estate industry by buying properties in San Francisco after he was discharged from the military back in the 1940s. It was a sound investment; at one point, he owned around a quarter of all of the office space in the city. Today, he has some 29 million square feet of space around the country. He often makes national headlines for his astronomical deals, such as his $990 million purchase of two Manhattan office buildings in 2008. Last year, the entrepreneur, now in his 10th decade on earth, told his personal story as part of an oral history project conducted by UC Berkley. The lessons he imparts: keep your personal interest separate from your business; avoid get-rich-quick schemes; classroom learning can never replace real-world experience; be careful with credit; and be prepared. Always have a Plan B…and a Plan C.
