Top 10 Richest People in Switzerland And Their Net Worth

Switzerland is a country in the European continent having foot touching other countries in Europe, meanwhile, Europe is one of the powerhouses of billionaires consisting of some of the finest and richest on the planet, and Switzerland is no different being one of the richest countries in Europe and the world, the richest people in Switzerland are co-contributors to the wealth of the continent.

Meanwhile, according to Wikipedia, the economy of Switzerland is secure, prosperous, and high-tech. According to many rankings, it is the country with the highest per-capita income. The nation is rated as one of the least corrupt in the world, but its banking industry is considered to be “among the most corrupt in the world.” According to nominal GDP, its economy ranks twenty-first in the world, and thirty-eighth in terms of purchasing power parity.

Manufacturing is the most significant economic sector in Switzerland. Specialty chemicals, medical and pharmaceutical supplies, scientific and fine-measuring equipment, and musical instruments are examples of manufactured goods. Chemicals account for 34% of all exported goods, followed by electronics/machines (20.9%) and fine jewelry/watches (16.9%) which is where most of the richest people in Switzerland got their wealth from.

The richest people in Switzerland are ranked to be among the world powerful people and among the top #500 richest people in the world.

Richest People in Switzerland

Below is the table with the names of each of the billionaires that will be in this list of the top 10 richest people in Switzerland, along with how much they are worth and their source of wealth;

1. Guillaume Pousaz – $23 billion

Guillaume Pousaz is the richest man as well as the richest person in Switzerland. Pousaz is among the top 500 richest people in the world he takes the spot as the 54th richest person in the world. He is the CEO and founder of the online payment platform Checkout.com, and being a Swiss billionaire businessman, he is based in Dubai.

Before working in fintech and payments, Pousaz, a Swiss citizen, dropped out of college to go surfing in California. Checkout.com was established in 2012 by Guillaume Pousaz to address the issue of online payment processing for merchants and customers worldwide. Checkout.com raised $1 billion from private investors in January 2022, valuing the business at $40 billion.

Meanwhile, due to the pandemic, according to Checkout.com, the volume of payments processed more than tripled in 2020 compared to the previous year. He takes the lead among the richest people in Switzerland o this list.

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2. Ernesto Bertarelli – $8.4 billion

With a total net worth of $8.4 billion dollars, Ernesto Bertarelli is the second richest man in Switzerland as well as the second richest person in Switzerland. Bartarelli is an Italian-born Swiss billionaire businessman and philanthropist who inherited the company stake from his grandfather who helped founded Serono, a pharmaceutical company in 1906.

Following his father’s passing in 1998, Ernesto Bertarelli took over the biotech company Serono, which produces the drug Rebif for multiple sclerosis.
Before selling it to Merck for over $13 billion in 2007, he and his sister Dona grew the business to $2.4 billion in revenues.

Investments made by the family’s Waypoint Group range from pharmaceutical firms to commercial real estate in London. In addition, Bertarelli owns a superyacht named, Vava II, which put him in the spot as one of the billionaires in the world to own a yacht or more. He takes the second spot among the richest people in  Switzerland.

3. Magdalena Martullo-Blocher – $5.6 billion

Magdalena is the first woman to appear on this of the richest people in Switzerland with a net worth of $5.6 million. She is a billionaire businesswoman from Switzerland who also happens to be the daughter of former Swiss Federal Councillor Christoph Blocher. She holds a majority stake in Ems-Chemie Holding AG and serves as the company’s executive vice chairman and delegate to the board of directors. Since 2015, she has served as a representative for the canton of Graubünden in the National Council.

Magdalena Martullo-Blocher owes her wealth to her ownership of EMS-Chemie, a major producer of polymers and chemicals in Switzerland. When her father Christoph Blocher left the company in 2004 to join the Swiss Federal Council, she assumed control of it.

Rahel, Miriam, and Markus, Magdalena’s three billionaire siblings, were the buyers of his shares.
She held management positions at Johnson & Johnson and Swiss beverage manufacturer Rivella prior to joining the EMS-Chemie board in 2001. Magdalena entered politics in 2015 and was elected as a national councilor to the Swiss parliament, following in her father’s political footsteps.

4. Rahel Blocher – $5.6 billion

Rachel is the fourth richest person in Switzerland and she comes as the second woman to appear on this list of richest people in Switzerland.

Rahel Blocher owes her fortune to EMS-Chemie, the long-running family business and global leader in polymers and chemicals in Switzerland. When Christoph Blocher, her father, sold his shares to his children in 2004 so that he could join the Swiss Federal Council, she received a stake in the company.

Markus, one of her brothers, and her sisters Magdalena and Miriam are all multimillionaires.
Rahel isn’t directly involved in the day-to-day operations of EMS-Chemie, in contrast to Magdalena, who has been the company’s CEO for a long time. Instead, she serves on the board of her father’s Schweizer Musikinsel Rheinau Foundation and runs her father’s investment firm, Robinvest.

5. Hansjoerg Wyss – $5.1 billion

Coming to the fifth richest person in Switzerland who is among the top richest people in Switzerland, having an approximate net worth of $5.1 billion dollars is Wyss.

Hansjoerg Wyss acquired his wealth through the $20.2 billion sale of the medical device company he founded, Synthes, to Johnson & Johnson in 2012. He currently owns shares in the publicly traded biotech firms Molecular Partners and NovoCure.

Wyss is one of the most generous people in the world and has charitable foundations with over $2 billion in assets. He promised to donate $120 million to the University of Zurich and ETH Zurich in 2014 to establish a center to speed up medical advancements. Wyss promised to donate $1 billion over ten years to conservation initiatives all over the world in an opinion piece he wrote for the New York Times in 2018.

6. Dona Bertarelli – $4.6 billion

Swiss businesswoman Dona Bertarelli is of Italian descent she serves as the Bertarelli Foundation’s co-president. She is also an accomplished sailor, having taken first place in the 2010 Bol d’Or Mirabaud and the 2013 Rolex Fastnet with her team Spindrift Racing. Also, Dona and her group also broke the record for the America Discovery Route in the same year and she joined UNCTAD as an advisor in 2020.

Additionally, Dona Bertarelli acquired the majority of her wealth when her family’s biotech company Serono was sold for more than $13 billion in 2007.

Dona served as Serono’s executive director of professional and public affairs in the 1990s. Switzerland’s richest person is her brother Ernesto and she is among the richest people in Switzerland as well as Europe. Most family possessions were divided between them. As a special adviser to the UN, she now devotes her time to marine conservation initiatives.

7. Thomas Schmidheiny – $4.5 billion

Thomas Schmidheiny is a Swiss billionaire businessman and the former chairman of cement manufacturer Holcim he is on this list as one of the richest people in Switzerland.

The 2014 mega-merger that created cement and building materials giant Lafarge Holcim also gave Thomas Schmidheiny the majority of his wealth.

The family business was started by his great-uncle Ernt in 1912, and over time, the family created an empire out of cement and bricks.

In 1984, his father Max divided the estate, and Thomas received the supplier of cement and concrete, Holcim. Concrete supplier Eternit was acquired by his brother Stephan.

Thomas, who is now Holcim’s honorary chairman, resigned from the board in 2018. He oversaw the business for 20 years before stepping down as chairman in 2003. Additionally, Schmidheiny owns wineries in Switzerland, Argentina, and California.

8. Martin Haefner – $4.3 billion

Martin Walter Haefner is a Swiss billionaire, who is also the son of the great billionaire Walter Haefner his father was the world’s oldest billionaire aged 101 before passing away in 2012 having a net worth of US$4.3 billion, he left him half of his holdings in CA Technologies. He is among the richest people in Switzerland.

The majority of Martin Haefner’s wealth comes from his prior investment in Broadcom-acquired CA Technologies, a maker of IT management software.

Additionally, he received a share of the auto dealer AMAG, which sells brands like Bentley, Porsche, Volkswagen, and Audi.

Eva Maria Bucher-Haefner, his sister, received equal shares of both CA Technologies and AMAG. In 2018, he acquired her ownership in AMAG.
With his sister, Martin shares ownership of the Bellerive Hotel in Lausanne, Switzerland.

9. Rudolf Maag – $3.9 billion

Rudolf Maag made his net worth from medical devices, he is placed in ninth place among the richest people in Switzerland.
The ninth richest person in Switzerland comes on the list of richest people in Switzerland with a net worth of $3.9 billion dollars.

After receiving his M.B.A. from Insead in 1973, Swiss pharmaceutical company Sandoz AG hired Maag and he started moving up the corporate ladder there.

Later, he changed jobs and joined the world’s largest dental company Straumann. In 1990, he acquired the company’s medical device division and later floated it as Stratec Medical.

He built up a 15% stake in the new company, which was later sold to Johnson & Johnson, by merging Stratec with the dominant Swiss medical device company Synthes in 1999.

10. Thomas Straumann – $3.8 billion

The last richest man on this list of richest people in Switzerland with a net worth of $3.8 million dollars is the Swiss billionaire Thomas Straumann. In the publicly traded Straumann Holding, the largest dental implant manufacturer in the world, Thomas Straumann has a 17% stake.

Meanwhile, in 1954, Reinhard Straumann, Straumann’s great-grandfather, established the business as an alloy research and development firm that produced implants for the treatment of bone fractures.

In the 1970s, the invention of titanium dental implants brought Fritz Straumann significant success. After joining the board of directors in 1990, Straumann directed the company to concentrate only on dental products. He founded Medartis 1997, a company that manufactures medical devices, and serves as its chairman.

Richest People in Switzerland

Here’s a quick rundown of the list of the richest people in Switzerland;

1. Guillaume Pousaz – $23.0 billion
2. Ernesto Bertarelli – $8.4 billion
3. Magdalena Martullo-Blocher – $5.6 billion
4. Rahel Blocher – $5.6 billion
5. Hansjoerg Wyss – $5.1 billion
6. Dona Bertarelli – $4.6 billion
7. Thomas Schmidheiny – $4.5 billion
8. Martin Haefner – $4.3 billion
9. Rudolf Maag – $3.9 billion
10. Thomas Straumann – $3.8 billion