Forrest Li Xiaodong (born 1977 or 1978), is a Chinese-born Singaporean billionaire businessman. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive officer of

Sea Limited The sea, connected as the world ocean or simply the ocean, is the body of salty water that covers approximately 71% of the Earth's surface. The word sea is also used to denote second-order sections of the sea, such as the Mediterranean Sea, ...

, a company with subsidiaries including

Garena Garena is a Singaporean game developer and publisher of free online games. It is the digital entertainment arm of parent company Sea Ltd, which was formerly named Garena. The company distributes game titles on Garena+ in various countries a ...

and

Shopee Shopee Pte. Ltd. (Shopee) is a Singaporean multinational technology company that specialises in e-commerce. The company was launched in Singapore in 2015, before it expanded abroad. , Shopee is considered the largest e-commerce platform in S ...

. He is also the Chairman of Lion City Sailors FC, a subsidiary of Sea Limited.

Biography

Li earned a bachelor's degree in engineering from

Shanghai Jiaotong University Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU; ) is a public research university in Shanghai, China. The university is funded by the Ministry of Education of China. The university was established on April 8, 1896 as Nanyang Public School (南洋� ...

, and an MBA from

Stanford Graduate School of Business The Stanford Graduate School of Business (also known as Stanford GSB) is the Postgraduate education, graduate business school of Stanford University, a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California. For several years it ...

. Li did not come from generational wealth; Li was $100,000 in student loan debt and along with his wife previously lived in a single bedroom within a three-room public housing HDB flat at Braddell. He later decided to settle permanently in Singapore, taking up citizenship. Li's first company was Garena in 2009. At the time, the company had only operated out of a single shophouse off Maxwell Road at

Tanjong Pagar Tanjong Pagar ( alternatively spelled ''Tanjung Pagar'') is a historic district located within the Central Business District in Singapore, straddling the Outram Planning Area and the Downtown Core under the Urban Redevelopment Authority's urb ...

. In March 2019, after the share price of his consumer internet company

Sea Ltd Sea Limited (Stylized as: sea) is a tech conglomerate headquartered in Singapore. Established in 2009 by Forrest Li, Sea was initially founded as Garena, a game development and publishing company known for its ''Free Fire'' title. The compan ...

increased by 45%, Li's net worth increased to more than $1 billion. Li is a football fan. He is the chairman of the

Lion City Sailors Lion City Sailors Football Club, commonly referred to as The Sailors or LCS, is a Singaporean professional football club competing in the Singapore Premier League, the top tier of the Singapore football league system. Since the 2021 season, the ...

, a

Singapore Premier League The Singapore Premier League, commonly abbreviated as SPL, officially known as the AIA Singapore Premier League for sponsorship reasons, is a men's professional football league sanctioned by the Football Association of Singapore (FAS), which ...

football club that was acquired by Sea in 2020.

Personal life

Li is married and lives in Singapore. Li appeared on the August 2020 cover of ''Forbes Asia'', the Asia edition of ''

Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also r ...

'' magazine. According to ''

Bloomberg Billionaires Index The ''Bloomberg Billionaires Index'', launched in March 2012, is a daily ranking of the world's 500 richest people based on their net worth. It draws information from "action in the stock market, economic indicators and news reports", features a p ...

'', Li's net worth was estimated at US$19.8 billion as of August 2021, making him the richest person in

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

References

Living people Naturalised citizens of Singapore Singaporean billionaires Stanford University alumni 1970s births {{Singapore-business-bio-stub