Real estate, technology, healthcare, inheritances.
All are among the more familiar sources of wealth in Orange County.
But what about food and beverages?
That’s a less-than-obvious category of business that accounts for the basis or a significant portion of six of the fortunes on the OC’s Wealthiest list—better than 10% of the entries that make up the centerpiece of this week’s special edition of the Business Journal (see inside pullout section with profiles, list; related stories throughout).
The total wealth stemming from the food-and-beverage business comes to $5.7 billion, a bit less than 10% of the $62 billion total on this year’s list.
The total got a big boost by the addition of Rodney Sacks and Hilton Schlosberg, both newly minted billionaires based on their holdings in Monster Beverage Corp. Not bad—with or without the energy drink entrepreneurs—for a category that doesn’t typically crop up among the obvious sources of great fortunes in OC but includes everything from the In-N-Out burger chain to the heritage of Hot Pockets and ongoing Budweiser distributorships.
A couple of local billionaires count ties to media—another illustration of the sort of diversity of fortunes that can confound preconceived notions about OC.
Jim Jannard made his first billions on Oakley Inc. and has been adding to his pile lately with Red Digital Cinema Camera Co., which has won hard-fought ground in Hollywood and other commercial and consumer markets with sales of high-definition cameras made in Irvine.
Arte Moreno’s first fortune came in a straight-up, old-school medium—billboards—and he’s done even better with the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, a team that gets a big chunk of its revenue by selling games as content for various other media (see Data Drill: Sources of Wealth by Industry, page 22 of pullout).
Up 15%
The estimated wealth of $62 billion accounted for by the 41 entries—there are 42 individuals this year, with one couple listed jointly—is about on par with the gross domestic product of the African nation of Kenya (see Data Drill, Comparisons, in pullout).
The total also represents an increase of 15% or so over last year, owing to steady gains for most members of the list, along with the addition of three entries, including two newly minted billionaires.
The gains reflect the economic strength that has been obvious here for the past several years and that now includes the larger Southern California region and statewide more recently.
10-Year Comparison
A comparison to our list 10 years ago—the 2006 list came just before OC preceded the rest of the region, state and nation in the start of a slide that eventually became the free fall of the Great Recession—shows how powerful an economic recovery can be for an established fortune in the hands of savvy stewards with broad-based portfolios.
This year’s total is more than double the $27.8 billion 10 years ago.
The difference owes partly to expanded research efforts by the Business Journal: the 2006 list had only 27 entries.
Long-term gains also figure prominently (see Data Drill, Top 20, page 8 of pullout).
Jannard and Moreno were among the most significant gainers over the past year, which saw Donald Bren, chairman of Newport Beach-based developer and landlord Irvine Company, retain his spot as perennial list-topper.
We estimate that Bren’s fortune grew by about 8% over the past year to $16.2 billion. His gain of $1.2 billion outpaces the cumulative increase for the entire list in 2006—a year that saw a number of tech-based fortunes droop on a downturn that dogged the industry independent of the larger economy.
The tech crowd is up this year, led by healthy gains for Henry Samueli and Henry Nicholas, co-founders of Broadcom Corp. Both have gotten a big boost on the value of their shares in the chipmaker, thanks to Singapore-based Avago Technologies Ltd.’s recent premium bid for the company.
Orange County’s long-standing position as a center of technology is reflected beyond Samueli and Nicholas. Various segments of technology—including some overlap with healthcare and real estate—account as a primary basis or significant contributor to nine entries altogether, including two of three tied for second place after Bren.
A total of eight of the fortunes have a main or significant tie to real estate, an industry that continues to uphold an historical standard by remaining dominant in terms of dollars, with Bren’s fortune ensuring the lion’s share for the category. Fortunes based primarily on real estate combine for an estimated $25 billion, approximately 40% of the total this year.
Process
Our listings are limited to individuals who live here or have derived most of their wealth from OC.
It takes an estimated worth of $250 million to crack this week’s list, the same threshold as last year.
We’ve spent weeks looking into individual holdings, company assets, public records and press clippings, and talking with trusted sources as we’ve researched the list.
Our numbers are generally conservative, ballpark figures. We’ve sought to take assets into account, factor in debt, determine the cost of exercising stock options, and consider other factors.
Some individuals on our list cooperated with us to provide guidance for our estimates, while others declined.
A few have told us they would prefer not to be on the list at all.
The list remains a work in progress.
We’ve done our best to track down who we believe are OC’s wealthiest people. But we are sure to have missed some. We look forward to comments on those we might have overlooked.
