31. Gerald (Gerry) Schwartz and Heather Reisman
Net worth: $1.57 billion | Up 37% | Location: Toronto | 06 rank: 39
Indigo Books & Music’s July sales were up 28% over last year, thanks in large part to brisk sales of the last Harry Potter instalment. With Q2 revenues up 14.8%, Reisman’s “big, hairy, audacious” goals — including the opening of 18 new superstores in as many months — are proceeding as planned. Schwartz continues his role as Canada’s answer to Henry Kravis: his Onex Corp. (TSX: OCX) recently purchased Husky Injection Molding Systems Ltd. for just under $1 billion, and teamed up with Magna’s Frank Stronach on a failed bid for Chrysler. Last November, the power couple donated $2 million to Toronto’s SickKids Foundation for an exchange program to bring Israeli physicians to Canada.
32. Reichmann Family
Net worth: $1.56 billion | Up 1% | Location: Toronto | 06 rank: 28
After about a year on the market, IPC US REIT (TSX: IUR.UN) sold to Dallas-based Behringer Harvard REIT Inc. for $1.4 billion. The Reichmanns’ 13% stake in IPC means they’ll garner about $65 million from the deal. In November, the family took in another US$602 million when it sold its share of Sunrise Senior Living REIT (NYSE: SRZ) to Ventas Inc. (NYSE: VTR) They’ve done a little buying, too. ReichmannHauer Capital Partners Inc., the private-equity investment firm owned by Philip Reichmann and Frank Hauer, bought Black’s Photo Corp., the Canadian retail photography company.
33. Terence (Terry) Matthews
Net worth: $1.53 billion | Up 12% | Location: Ottawa | 06 rank: 32
Overseeing mergers and acquisitions has kept the co-founder and chairman of Mitel Networks Corp. busy this year. He became chairman of Vancouver-based CounterPath Corp. (OTCBB: COPA) in August when the company purchased NewHeights Software Corp., founded by Matthews’ son Owen in 1998, for $21.6 million. The same month, Mitel bought Arizona-based Inter-Tel Inc., a move expected to double Mitel’s revenue to more than US$800 million.
34. JR Shaw.
Net worth: $1.5 billion | Up 63% | Location: Calgary | 06 rank: 52
Shaw Communications Inc. (TSX: SJR.B), founded by JR in 1966, made waves this year with its criticisms of mandatory cable-sponsored subsidies to Canadian broadcasters. The company’s refusal to make monthly payments to the Canadian Television Fund provoked a CRTC review of the fund and a public debate over its role, that will continue into 2008.
35. Stephen Jarislowsky
Net worth: $1.48 billion | N/A | Location: Westmount, Quebec | 06 rank: 30
When this corporate governance activist disagreed with new policies at forest product firm Canfor Corp. (TSX: CFP), he didn’t waste time before leaving the board of directors. Jarislowsky, who runs investment firm Jarislowsky Fraser Ltd., didn’t seek re-election as a Canfor director this year after learning a majority of shareholders would vote down a poison-pill measure that restricts “creeping takeover” by larger shareholders.
36. Lalji Family
Net worth: $1.4 billion | Up 53% | Location: Vancouver | 06 rank: 50
A $1.4-billion property deal between the federal government and Larco Investments Ltd., the real estate firm privately held by Lalji brothers Amin and Mansoor, closed in late October. Larco bought seven federal office buildings across the country, which it will lease back to the government for the next 25 years. Larco also bought up Bridge Studios in May for $40 million and promised to continue using it for film and television production despite the high market value of the 15-acre site in Burnaby, B.C.
37. Clay Riddell
Net worth: $1.35 billion | Up 37% | Location: Calgary | 06 rank: 13
Riddell started Paramount Resources (TSX: POU) spinoff MGM Energy Corp. (TSX: MGX), with interests in the Mackenzie Delta and Mackenzie Valley, last January to explore Canada’s fuel-rich Arctic. If all goes according to plan, MGM Energy will help Riddell get his birthday wish — gas flowing from the Mackenzie Delta pipeline by the time he turns 75 in 2012.
38. Seymour Schulich
Net worth: $1.33 billion | Up 9% | Location: Toronto | 06 rank: 35
The co-founder of Franco-Nevada Mining Corp., and chairman of Newmont Capital, shared a lifetime of experience in his new book Get Smarter: Life and Business Lessons. The bestseller began its fourth printing this autumn. Schulich hasn’t forgotten his philanthropist goals — if more than 100,000 copies are sold, he will donate $1 million to the Indigo Love of Reading Foundation.
39. Brandt Louie
Net worth: $1.29 billion | Up 7% | Location: Vancouver | 06 rank: 36
A new $50-million business jet from Bombardier will be added to Louie’s London Air Services charter fleet next year. Also new to the H. Y. Louie Co. Ltd. is a 4,500-square-foot conference centre at Sonora Resort, Louie’s luxury wilderness lodge on the west coast. The company has not ruled out expansion of its flagship London Drugs chain into Ontario or acquisition opportunities.
40. John MacBain
Net worth: $1.24 billion| Up 3% | Location: Geneva, Switzerland | 06 rank: 37
Trader Classified Media, the classified advertising firm founded by MacBain and his ex-wife Louise Blouin MacBain, disposed of its last stake in an operational entity — a 55% interest in Taiwan’s Car News — in June, and now has no non-financial assets of material value left. Now that he has completely sold the company, MacBain can focus on his newly established Geneva-based organization, the McCall MacBain Foundation, which primarily centres on health and education in sub-Saharan Africa.
