Meg Whitman is the wealthiest women in the technology sector

Hewlett-Packard’s chief executive Meg Whitman is the wealthiest women in the technology sector with a fortune of $1.3 billion followed by Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg and Alibaba’s Lucy Peng, according to a Wealth-X estimate.

The net worth of women on the Wealth-X list lags far behind their male peers in the technology sector, said global wealth intelligence and prospecting firm.

Microsoft founder Bill Gates, for example, has a net worth of around $85.1 billion, according to Wealth-X estimates, while Mark Zuckerberg, the 30-year-old Facebook chairman, is worth at least $35 billion.

According to the list of five wealthiest women in the technology sector released on Wednesday, Whitman claimed the top spot with a $1.3 billion fortune.

Bulk of Whitman’s wealth is derived from profits from the sales of her shares in eBay, a company that she led from 1998 to 2008 during its dramatic expansion, the report said.

Ranking second on the list is Facebook’s chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg, with a net worth of $1.22 billion.

Upon joining Facebook in 2008, Sandberg received company stock as part of her compensation plan. Since 2012, she has been selling off her Facebook shares, generating more than $700 million in cash before taxes. However, she still holds $430 million in Facebook stock.

Alibaba co-founder Lucy Peng (also known as Peng Lei) took third place with a personal fortune of $1.2 billion.

The 42-year-old executive, who heads Alibaba’s Ant Financial Services Group, became a billionaire in 2014 upon the valuation of the Chinese e-commerce giant prior to its record-setting IPO.

The 56 year old Wang Hsiueh Hong, the co-founder and Chairman of HTC, was ranked fourth on the list with a fortune of $890 million dollar.

Fifth is the the youngest female tech executive on the list, 39-year-old Marissa Mayer, CEO of Yahoo, having a net worth of $410 million.

Source-NDTV