Hansjörg Wyss
Born	Bern, Switzerland
Alma mater	Harvard Business School Swiss Federal Institute of Technology
Occupation	businessman, philanthropist
Net worth	$6 billion USD (2008)

Hansjörg Wyss (pronounced HAHNZ-jorg VEES) is a Swiss entrepreneur and businessman. As of 2008, Wyss ranks #164 on the Forbes list of billionaires with a net worth of approximately $6 billion,^[1] making him the second richest person in Switzerland.^[2][3]

Wyss was born and raised in Bern, Switzerland. After receiving a Master of Science degree in Civil and Structural Engineering from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in 1959, Wyss attended the Harvard University Graduate School of Business from 1963 to 1965. From 1965 to 1969, he worked in various positions in the textile industry, including plant engineer and project manager for Chrysler in Pakistan, Turkey, and the Philippines. In 1977, Wyss became president of Synthes, a firm manufacturing Swiss-designed medical devices. Alongside his professional activities, Wyss became actively involved in landscape protection by buying up the mineral rights from the mining companies.^[4] In 1989, he established the Wyss Foundation, which establishes and sponsors informal partnerships between non-governmental organisations and the United States administration to place large swathes of land under government protection. On account of these efforts, almost 4,400,000 acres (17,800 km²) of land have been declared national park districts.^[5] Wyss serves on the boards of The Wilderness Society, the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, Rails-to-Trails, and the Grand Canyon Trust, and is an honorary member of the AO Foundation.^[6]

In 2000, Wyss purchased the 900-acre (3.6 km²) Halter Ranch in western Paso Robles, California. In 2004, Forbes ranked Wyss the 26th wealthiest person in Europe with almost $6 billion; by 2005, he rose to 18th place with an accumulated wealth of almost $8 billion.^[7] In 2006, Wyss was ranked #72 on The Times list of 100 Richest People in the World.^[8] In 2007, he received the Harvard Business School Alumni Achievement Award,^[9][10] and in fall 2008, it was announced that Wyss donated the largest single endowment from one source in Harvard's history when he gave $125 million to the school to found a multidisciplinary institute at the Medical School.^{[3][11][12][13][14][15][16][17]}

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Bio at Halter Ranch
• Hansjörg Wyss, Honorary Doctorate of the Faculty of Medicine, University of Basel