Immigrant Entrepreneur Hall of Fame: Fortune 500
Some of the largest companies and best known brands in the United States were founded by immigrants. A 2011 study concluded that 40 percent of the Fortune 500 were founded by immigrants or the children of immigrants.
Here we have profiled 37 of these immigrant entrepreneurs. They were inventors, financiers, pioneers and philanthropists. Today, the companies they founded collectively produce more than $840 billion in annual revenue.
Alexander Graham Bell
Scotland
AT&T, Verizon founder
Ranked 12 and 16 in the 2011 Fortune 500
James Gamble and William Procter
Ireland and England
Procter & Gamble co-founders
Ranked 26 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Charles Pfizer
Germany
Pfizer Inc. co-founder
Ranked 31 in the 2011 Fortune 500
James L. (J.L.) Kraft
Canada
Kraft Foods founder
Ranked 49 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Daniel Aaron
Germany
Comcast co-founder
Ranked 66 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Albert Butz
Switzerland
Honeywell International founder
Ranked 81 in the 2011 Fortune 500
E. I. du Pont
France
DuPont co-founder
Ranked 84 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Andrew Carnegie
Scotland
TIAA-CREF and United States Steel co-founder
Ranked 87 and 148 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Sergey Brin
Russia
Google co-founder
Ranked 92 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Hugh Chisholm
Canada
International Paper co-founder
Ranked 105 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Max and Morris Feldberg
Russia
TJX Companies, Inc., BJ’s Wholesale Club co-founders
Ranked 119 and 221 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Alexander and Charles Meston
Scotland
Emerson co-founders
Ranked 120 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Nigel Morris
England
Capital One Financial co-founder
Ranked 134 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Maxwell Kohl
Poland
Kohl’s founder
Ranked 142 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Thomas Alexander Mellon
Ireland
BNY Mellon founder
Ranked 165 in the 2011 Fortune 500
John Pitcairn Jr.
Scotland
PPG Industries founder
Ranked 181 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Nathan Cummings
Canada
Sara Lee co-founder
Ranked 191 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Andreas (Andy) von Bechtolsheim and Vinod Khosla
Germany and India
Sun Microsystems, Inc. co-founders
Ranked 204 in the 2010 Fortune 500 (Purchased by Oracle in 2010)
Hernand and Sosthenes Behn
St. Thomas
ITT co-founders
Ranked 217 in the 2011 Fortune 500
George N. Hatsopoulos
Greece
Thermo Fischer Scientific co-founder
Ranked 227 in 2011 Fortune 500
John W. Nordstrom
Sweden
Nordstrom founder
Ranked 254 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Pierre Omidyar
France
eBay founder
Ranked 269 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Frederick Weyerhäuser
Germany
Weyerhaeuser founder
Ranked 354 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Jerry Yang
Taiwan
Yahoo! Inc. co-founder
Ranked 365 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Kiran Patel
Zambia
WellCare Health Plans founder
Ranked 420 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Walter Bowes
England
Pitney Bowes founder
Ranked 421 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Sol Shenk
Russia
Big Lots founder
Ranked 453 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Ivor Royston and Charles Weissman
England and Switzerland
Biogen Idec co-founders
Ranked 476 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Francisco D’Souza
India
Cognizant co-founder
Ranked 484 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Theodore Deutschmann
England
Co-founded RadioShack co-founder
Ranked 492 in the 2011 Fortune 500
Levi Strauss
Germany
Levi Strauss founder
Ranked 496 in the 2011 Fortune 500
