12 Greatest Entrepreneurs in the World

Bill Gates

Only a few extraordinary entrepreneurs get a chance to change the world in their lifetime. But Bill Gates is among those who got this chance twice. The dominant geek helped usher in the personal computer revolution. At present, he deals with complex challenges of global health and public education as the world's most liberal philanthropist. The similarity in Microsoft and Bill & Melinda Gates’ Foundation is Gates’ techniques to hire smart people and put them to work to solve big issues. According to Gates, deciding to go into business with Paul Allen, co-founder of Microsoft, and hiring a friend, Steve Ballmer, was some of his best business decisions. Talking about Ballmer, Gates said, "Some of the ideas you run by him, you know he's going to say, `Hey, wait a minute. Have you thought about this or that?' The benefit of speaking off somebody who's got that kind of brilliance is that it not only makes business more fun, but it really leads to a lot of success." Today Microsoft employs 90,000 people and the company’s market value is $273.5 billion.