Serono

Ernesto Bertarelli is a Swiss-Italian billionaire and entrepreneur. Together with his extended family, Bertarelli was ranked 81st in the 2011 annual... ranking of the world's wealthiest people compiled and published by Forbes magazine, The family's wealth was estimated at US$10.6 billion. Born in Rome, his family moved to Switzerland in 1977. He graduated from Babson College in 1989, and earned an MBA at Harvard Business School in 1993. His father founded Serono, a pharmaceutical company that he moved from Rome to Switzerland. Bertarelli became CEO and Deputy Chairman in 1996, and with his sister Dona inherited ownership in 1998 on the death of his father. Changing the company's focus from pharmaceuticals to biotechnology, revenues increased from $809 million in 1996 to $2.8 billion in 2006. The company gained fame from its discovery of a natural hormone used in the treatment of female infertility. Bertarelli instructed advisers in 2006, agreeing to sell the company to Merck KGaA of Germany in January 2007 for US$13.3 billion, forming the new company Merck-Serono. He and his sister split a combined $9 billion stake.
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