Lonnie Johnson is an African-American inventor and engineer who has an estimated net worth of $360 million. Born Lonnie George Johnson on October 6, 1949 in Mobile, Alabama, he graduated with a master’s degree from the University of Tuskegee. He joined the U.S. Air Force and was assigned to the Strategic Air Command. He has helped develop the stealth bomber program. He was also assigned as a systems engineer for the Galileo Mission to Jupiter and the Cassini Mission to Saturn.

Johnson is best known as the inventor of the Super Soaker water gun, one of the most popular toys in the world that has generated over $2 million in retail sales. Over the years, it has total to almost $1 billion in sales. He also owns two companies that develop energy technology; Exellatron Solid State and Johnson Electro-Mechanical Converter System (JEMS). Excellatron developed thin film batteries while JEMS developed the Johnson Thermo-Electrochemical Converter System (JTEC) which was listed as one of the top inventions of 2009 by Popular Mechanics. It also has the potential to make solar power competitive with coal for an efficient and renewable solar energy.

In 2008, Lonnie Johnson received the Breakthrough Award from Popular Mechanics for his work on JTEC. He is also working with the Palo Alto Research Center Incorporated in California to further fund and develop JTEC. He was inducted into the State of Alabama Engineering Hall of Fame in 2011.