Nicky Oppenheimer
Nicholas F. Oppenheimer is a South African billionaire businessman and philanthropist. He was formerly the chairman of De Beers diamond mining company and of its subsidiary, the Diamond Trading Company, and former deputy chairman of Anglo American. He is the third richest African.
- Oppenheimer, heir to his family’s fortune, sold his 40% stake in diamond firm DeBeers to mining group Anglo American for $5.1 billion in cash in 2012.
- He was the third generation of his family to run DeBeers, and took the company private in 2001.
- For 85 years until 2012, the Oppenheimer family occupied a controlling spot in the world’s diamond trade.
- In 2014, Oppenheimer started Fireblade Aviation in Johannesburg, which operates chartered flights with its fleet of 3 planes and 2 helicopters.
- He owns at least 720 square miles of conservation land across South Africa, Botswana and Zimbabwe.
