Amancio Ortega is a Spanish businessman, founder, and former Chairman and CEO of the clothing retail company Inditex, best known for its Zara fashion stores. He owns 59,394% of the company shares, equivalent to approximately $54 billion, which constitute most of his fortune. Ortega received dividends from Inditex for $1,071 million in 2014, $1,151 million in 2015, $1,328 million in 2016, $1,505 million in 2017, $1,661 million in 2018, $1,948 million in 2019, and $779 million in 2020. He has an estimated net worth of $82 billion as of March 2021 and is the second richest person in Europe.

Ortega was born on March 28, 1936, in Busdongo de Arbas, León, Spain, a village of 60 people located in the northwestern region of the country. His parents were Antonio Ortega Rodríguez, a railway worker, and Josefa Gaona Hernández, a housemaid. He is the youngest of four children. At the age of fourteen, Ortega found a job where he learned to make clothes by hand.

From 1966 to 1986, he was married to Rosalía Mera, who died in August 2013 being Spain's richest woman. Then he married Flora Pérez in 2001. Ortega has a daughter with Pérez named Marta, 33, and a daughter and a son from his first marriage, Sandra, 48, and Marcos, 46. The businessman drives an Audi A8 luxury sedan and owns a private jet valued at $45 million. Ortega lives with his wife in a sea-facing house in La Coruña, Galicia, Spain, a city of almost 250,000 inhabitants where he is often seen walking his dog. Until 1999, no photograph of Ortega had been published. He likes to dress simply and refuses to wear a tie.

Ortega started his career in the field of textile manufacturing in 1963. In 1972, he established Confecciones Goa, the first Inditex garment factory, and in 1975 Zara España, the first distribution firm and retail seller, with his then-wife Rosalia Mera. A decade later, Ortega merged Zara into Inditex. From 1988 to 1990, Inditex expanded to Portugal, France, and the United States. In the following decade, he created Pull&Bear and Bershka brands and acquired Massimo Dutti and Stradivarius. Inditex raised $2.7 billion in its 2001 Initial Public Offering (IPO). Ortega resigned as Chairman and CEO of the company in 2011, but he still goes to work every day and is a member of the board. Inditex headquarters are in Arteixo, outside La Coruña, Galicia, Spain, and it has eight brands and 7,500 stores around the world that employed tens of thousands globally. The company earned 3.250 billion in 2014, 3.099 billion in 2015, 3.842 billion in 2016, 3.505 billion in 2017, 4.65 billion in 2018, and 4.361 million in 2019.

Ortega is Chairman and CEO of Pontegadea, a private limited company through which he controls his shareholding at Inditex in order to avoid his stocks being placed in the market if he died. The holding has assets of $17.1 billion, mostly office and shopping districts, and it had revenue of $744 million from real estate investments in 2019. The portfolio of the company includes properties like the headquarters of consultancy McKinsey in London ($839 million), The Post Building in London ($770 million), the Troy Block complex, where Amazon Seattle has its headquarters ($740 million), the Torre Picasso in Madrid ($556 million), the Cepsa Tower in Madrid ($550 million), the Southeast Financial Center in Washington ($517 million), an entire block of Miami Beach’s Lincoln Road ($370 million), The Investment Building, located in Washington’s central business district ($385 million), an office building neighboring the White House ($213 million), the Manhattan’s Haughwout Building ($160 million), a building in New York’s Soho neighborhood ($145 million), and the San Francisco’s Tiffany Building ($135 million). The real estate portfolio is mostly made up of properties located in the United States (35%), the United Kingdom (30%), and Spain (25%). Besides real estate, Pontegadea also invested in energy buying 5% of Enagas ($311 million), a company that owns and operates Spain's gas grid. The holding also acquired 9.99% of Telxius ($460 million), a company that owns telecommunication towers and submarine fiber optic cables. The holding sold its stake in Telxius in 2021.

In July 2001, Ortega founded The Amancio Ortega Foundation. The organization takes care of educational and social issues and carries out programs related to talent training, special education, public oncology, social facilities, scholarships, among others. The non-profit donated $344 million to provide technology in breast cancer screening and treatment in public hospitals. Previously to the existence of his foundation, Ortega donated almost $24 million to Caritas Internationalis, a Roman Catholic organization.

Sources: Bisnow, Bisnow (2), Bloomberg, Bloomberg (2), Bloomberg (3), Bloomberg (4), Business Insider, CNN, CP Executive, El País, El País (2), El País (3), El País (4), Fashion Network, Fashion Network (2), Financial Times, Forbes, Fundación Amancio Ortega, Inditex, Inditex (2), Inditex (3), Inditex (4), Inditex (5), Inditex (6), Miami Herald, Newsy List, Philanthropy News Digest, Reuters, Reuters (2), SP Global, The Real Deal, Think Spain.

This article was updated on March 12, 2021 by Andrés Taurian

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