World Top Billionaires

Mikhail Maratovich Fridman, (born 21 April 1964) or Mikhail Friedman is a Jewish-Russian businessman. He is one of the youngest of Russian oligarchs (Roman Abramovich is younger). In 2007, Forbes assessed his wealth as $12.6 billion, placing him 45th richest in the world.

Along with Peter Aven, Fridman founded the Alfa Group Consortium, a holding company which today controls Alfa Bank (opened in 1991), Alfa Capital, Tyumen Oil and several construction material firms (cement, timber, glass) as well as food processing businesses and a supermarket chain. The two are also major holders of tea and sugar plant processors.

In 2003 merged his oil company, TNK, with BP-quite an achievement, considering that six years prior BP was in a bitter fight with Fridman, protesting his methods of taking over a partly BP-owned oilfield. Last year Fridman paid more attention to his telecom assets; bought 13% stake in Turkcell, Turkey's largest cellular operator, adding to the group's stakes in Vimpelcom and Megafon (Russia), Kyivstar (Ukraine), Golden Telecom (USA), Buztel and Uzmacom (Uzbekistan).