Forbes lists 3 Triangle entrepreneurs among richest Americans. They all live in Cary.
Three North Carolinians have been named among the richest Americans, according to an annual ranking from the business magazine Forbes.
All three of them — Jim Goodnight, John Sall and Tim Sweeney — work in the technology industry and call Cary home.
The list, which ranked the 400 richest U.S. residents, showed that Goodnight, the co-founder of SAS Institute, is once again the richest man in North Carolina.
Forbes’ analysis this year has shown the 78-year-old Goodnight and his fellow Cary tech entrepreneur, Epic Games’ CEO Sweeney, 50, have gone back and forth as the richest person in the state.
In April, Forbes reported that Sweeney’s net worth had swelled to $7.4 billion, thanks to Epic’s own valuation reaching $29 billion. At the same time, the magazine said Goodnight’s net worth had fallen to $6.5 billion, meaning he had lost his title as the richest person in the state for the first time in decades.
But the new analysis by Forbes pegs Goodnight’s current value at $8.8 billion — pushing him back ahead of Sweeney and making him the 90th richest person in the U.S.
Sweeney, the controlling shareholder of Epic, stayed at $7.4 billion — a sum large enough to make him the 120th richest American.
Both Goodnight and Sweeney were given a philanthropy score of 1 by Forbes, the lowest the magazine offered. The magazine said the ranking reflects that they have donated less than 1% of their fortunes, something they shared with a third of the total list, according to Forbes.
Sall, Goodnight’s co-founder at SAS, sports a net worth of $4.4 billion and is ranked No. 253 on the richest Americans list. Forbes gave him a philanthropy score of 2, meaning he’s donated between 5% and 9.99% of his money.
One Triangle billionaire who missed out on making the top 400 list is Mark Rein, Sweeney’s co-founder at Epic Games.
Rein, it was revealed in the Epic v. Apple court case this year, owns a 4% stake in the company. At its most recent valuation, which was pegged at $28.7 billion in April, Rein’s stake would be worth around $1.1 billion.
That puts him at least $1.8 billion behind the individual ranked No. 400 on Forbes’ list.
It has been a busy year for the Triangle’s richest entrepreneurs.
Sweeney has taken Apple, the most valuable company in the world, to court on an ambitious antitrust crusade against its App Store.
While Sweeney did win a partial change to the App Store’s rules — a judge ruled that Apple can no longer block developers from communicating alternative payment options to customers outside of the App Store — Epic’s broader claims were dismissed.
Additionally, the court ruled that Epic Games breached its contract with Apple when it placed an alternative payment system within Fortnite in August 2020, and Epic has paid Apple $6 million in response.
Epic has filed an appeal to the judge’s ruling in the case, a decision that could stretch the lawsuit on for several years.
In the meantime, Apple continues to ban Fortnite from its App Store, and it has no plans to reinstate the app until all appeals have been exhausted, The News & Observer previously reported.
Sweeney has also continued to add to his vast land holdings in North Carolina over the past year as well, including large donations of land both in the Appalachian Mountains and a barrier island on the Southeastern coastline of the state.
For Goodnight and Sall, the biggest story line this year was that Goodnight seriously contemplated selling SAS, a company he founded while teaching at N.C. State University in 1976.
Goodnight had listened to offers from the semiconductor company Broadcom that would have valued the company as high as $20 billion.
However, shortly after the talks between Broadcom and SAS were reported, Goodnight and Sall changed their minds, The N&O reported. Goodnight owns two-thirds of SAS, while Sall owns the remaining third.
Goodnight has since announced intentions to take SAS public via an initial public offering by 2024.
SAS, whose customers include large banks and government agencies, posted revenues of $3 billion last year, according to its most recent annual report. However, that represented a decline in revenue of 2% to 3% from 2019.
This story was produced with financial support from a coalition of partners led by Innovate Raleigh as part of an independent journalism fellowship program. The N&O maintains full editorial control of the work. Learn more; go to bit.ly/newsinnovate
This story was originally published October 5, 2021 at 4:38 PM with the headline "Forbes lists 3 Triangle entrepreneurs among richest Americans. They all live in Cary.."
