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11 billionaires who dropped out of college before making their fortunes
11 billionaires who dropped out of college before making their fortunes
Taylor Nicole RogersAug 24, 2019, 18:47 IST
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
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You don't need an Ivy League degree to become a billionaire.
Some of the wealthiest people in the world dropped out of college to focus on their companies, while others made their fortunes long after leaving school.
You don't need an Ivy League degree to become a billionaire. Some billionaires don't have degrees at all, though not always for lack of trying.
Some dropped out to focus on their companies, like Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, while others made their fortunes long after leaving school, like Uber cofounder Travis Kalanick. These billionaires dropped out of a wide variety of schools, from Harvard to UCLA to The City College of New York.
Fashion designer Ralph Lauren dropped out of Baruch College at The City College of New York.
The 79-year-old designer founded his eponymous fashion company by selling ties out of his desk drawer while working in an office in the Empire State Building, according to the company's website.
The 35-year-old entrepreneur has a current net worth of $66 billion, Forbes estimates.
Las Vegas Sands CEO Sheldon Adelson dropped out of the City College of New York.
Adelson first became wealthy after founding a company called COMDEX that hosted technology-focused trade shows, Business Insider previously reported in May 2019. In 1995, Adelson and his partners sold it along with other smaller shows to SoftBank for $862 million.
The 86-year-old has a net worth of $33.1 billion, Forbes estimates.
CNN founder Ted Turner left Brown University before graduating ... but not by choice.
Turner was expelled from Brown for allowing his girlfriend to live with him in his dorm room, Business Insider previously reported. Despite the rather murky end to Turner's time as a student there, the university issued him honorary degrees years later.
The 80-year-old has a net worth of $2.2 billion, Forbes estimates.
Ty Warner, the creator of Beanie Babies, dropped out of Kalamazoo College in 1962 because he couldn't afford it, according to the Chicago Tribune.
Warner went on to sell encyclopedias, work as a valet, and sell stuffed animals for now-defunct toy company Dakin before founding Ty Inc. and creating the iconic Beanie Baby, according to HuffPost. Forbes reports that Warner also owns several hotels, including the Four Seasons in New York.
But Warner's career wasn't without controversy. He pled guilty to charges of tax evasion in 2017 for hiding income in a Swiss bank, according to HuffPost.
The 74-year-old now has a net worth of $2.6 billion, Forbes estimates.
DreamWorks Animation cofounder David Geffen once lied about having graduated from UCLA to keep a job in the mailroom of now-defunct talent agency William Morris.
Geffen later admitted publicly that he had actually dropped out of the University of Texas at Austin, according to Forbes. He worked as a talent agent at William Morris prior to founding DreamWorks.
The 76-year-old is now the richest man in Hollywood, and Forbes estimates that his net worth is about $8.4 billion.
Michael Dell dropped out of the University of Texas at Austin to sell computers.
As a student, Dell spent his spare time upgrading PCs and selling them from his dorm room, Business Insider previously reported in November 2018. He made $180,000 in his first month of business the summer after his freshman year and never went back to school.
The 54-year-old has a current net worth of $30.6 billion, Forbes estimates.
Oracle founder Larry Ellison dropped out of two different universities.
Ellison enrolled in the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign after high school but dropped out during his sophomore year after his adoptive mother died, Business Insider previously reported. He later completed one semester at the University of Chicago.
Uber cofounder and former CEO Travis Kalanick studied computer engineering at UCLA before dropping out to work on now-defunct search engine Scour.
After Scour filed for bankruptcy, Kalanick also founded a networking-software company called Red Swoosh. Kalanick sold Red Swoosh to Akamai for $23 million in 2007, Business Insider previously reported. He used some of that money to spend a year traveling the world before founding Uber.
The 43-year-old has a net worth of $3.7 billion, Forbes estimates.
