The 50 Who Matter Now

In our second annual ranking, Business 2.0 has compiled an unabashedly subjective list of people, products, trends, and ideas that are transforming the world of business.

By Business 2.0 staff
Sam Zell
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Sam Zell
Real estate magnate and media kingpin

Rank: 40

Why he matters: The Chicago billionaire is betting big against the Internet. Zell, 65, discovered his entrepreneurial spirit as a child, buying Playboy magazines downtown and reselling them for a profit in the suburbs. He went on to make a fortune in real estate, buying cheap and selling dear.

Today he's looking at undervalued property in the most unlikely of places: print media. First, Zell bought the Tribune Co., which owns the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times. Then he picked a fight with Google News, suggesting that the headline aggregator might have to start working for a living if newspapers like his decide to shut off the spigot of free news. Apostasy! But what if he's right?

Adelson
Calacanis
Bianchini
Iacobucci, Raburn
Graham
You
Williams
Musk
Melton
O'Reilly
Edmond
Zell
Huffington
Fake Steve Jobs
Walsh
Draft
Zuckerberg
Branson
Nooyi
Ambani bros.
Phillips
Negroponte
Hundt
Friis, Zennstrom
Cogan
Rosedale
Fadell
Kao
Arrington
Stephenson
Miyamoto
Eberhard
Agile software
Li
Diller
Chizen
Hurd
Wales
Bezos
McAndrews
Watanabe
Chambers
Schwarzenegger
Decker
Murdoch
Jacobs
Moritz
Private equity
Jobs
Google trio
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Most stock quote data provided by BATS. Market indices are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2018 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Factset: FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2018. All rights reserved. Chicago Mercantile Association: Certain market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. Dow Jones: The Dow Jones branded indices are proprietary to and are calculated, distributed and marketed by DJI Opco, a subsidiary of S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC and have been licensed for use to S&P Opco, LLC and CNN. Standard & Poor's and S&P are registered trademarks of Standard & Poor's Financial Services LLC and Dow Jones is a registered trademark of Dow Jones Trademark Holdings LLC. All content of the Dow Jones branded indices © S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC 2018 and/or its affiliates.

Contact Us Closed Captioning Manage Cookies+ Site Map

Most stock quote data provided by BATS. Market indices are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2018 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Factset: FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2018. All rights reserved. Chicago Mercantile Association: Certain market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. Dow Jones: The Dow Jones branded indices are proprietary to and are calculated, distributed and marketed by DJI Opco, a subsidiary of S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC and have been licensed for use to S&P Opco, LLC and CNN. Standard & Poor's and S&P are registered trademarks of Standard & Poor's Financial Services LLC and Dow Jones is a registered trademark of Dow Jones Trademark Holdings LLC. All content of the Dow Jones branded indices © S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC 2018 and/or its affiliates.