Sir James Dyson is the richest person in the East of England, according to this year’s edition of The Sunday Times Rich List.
The inventor, who has just launched a £600 electric mop, has an estimated wealth of £20.8 billion making him the wealthiest person in the region, followed by Kirsten Rausing and family with an estimated wealth of £12.634bn.
Sir James tops the region’s list despite recording a decline in wealth of £2.2bn for the year.
The list is published online today (Friday, 17 May) and will feature in the print edition of the newspaper on Sunday, 19 May.
Third in the list is Douw Steyn, who has seen his wealth grow by £900 million over the past year to £3 billion. The Comparethemarket businessman secured the increase due to large dividends of £868.1 million paid to its parent company.
This year’s list reveals the largest fall in the billionaire count in the guide’s 36-year history, from a peak of 177 in 2022 to 165 this year. This year’s list of 350 individuals and families together hold combined wealth of £795.361 billion — a sum larger than the annual GDP of Poland. The list is topped by Gopi Hinduja and his family for the third successive year in a row. The investor has an estimated record fortune of £37 billion.
Sir Elton John, Lord Lloyd-Webber and David and Victoria Beckham all appear in the annual survey. The minimum entry for the list of 350 this year is £350 million.
Ed Sheeran remains the richest young musician in the UK and the richest person under 40 in the East of England. The singer/songwriter paid himself £62 million for the first half of his Mathematics world tour, taking his total wealth to £340 million.
He is just pipped by Sir Lewis Hamilton, whose overall value of £350 million also sees him debut in the Rich List in 2024.
Robert Watts, compiler of the Sunday Times Rich List, said: “This year’s Sunday Times Rich List suggests Britain’s billionaire boom has come to an end. Many of our home-grown entrepreneurs have seen their fortunes fall and some of the global super rich who came here are moving away.
“Thousands of British livelihoods rely on the super-rich to some extent. We’ll have to wait and see whether we have now reached peak billionaire, and what that means for our economy.
“These may be harder times to create wealth, but The Sunday Times Rich List continues to unearth entrepreneurs building fortunes in diverse and often surprising ways. This year’s new entries include people who have made money from artificial intelligence and virtual worlds as well as plumbing supplies and teaching aides.
“We know many of our readers find such people — especially those from humbler backgrounds — very inspiring.”
For the full 350 richest people in the UK go online at www.thetimes.co.uk/sunday-times-rich-list.
