Америкалық миллиардер кәсіпкер Рон Бёрклдің өмірбаяны мен бизнесі

American billionaire businessman
Burkle's net worth was estimated at US$2 billion on February 12, 2018. He had been ranked No. 633 on Forbes' list of "The Richest People on The Planet 2014."

Ron Burkle was born on November 12, 1952, the elder of two sons, to Betty and Joseph Burkle in Pomona, California. To see his father, Burkle stocked shelves in his father's store with bread and corralled shopping carts. By age 13, Burkle had joined United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 770. Less than two years later, Burkle dropped out. During the 1992 Los Angeles riots, Burkle refused to close his inner city stores, a move for which he received praise. He has served as chairman of the board and controlling shareholder of numerous companies, including Alliance Entertainment, Golden State Foods, Dominick's, Fred Meyer, Ralphs, and Food4Less. He has been a corporate board member of the boards of Occidental Petroleum Corporation, KB Home, and Yahoo! Burkle is often seen as a businessman who maintains close relationships with labor unions and works with unions to solve business problems.

Burkle is part owner of the Pittsburgh Penguins of the National Hockey League, although his stake in the team is unknown. In 1999, he helped save the team by partnering with former Penguin Mario Lemieux to bring the team out of bankruptcy. Burkle played an active part in negotiations to construct the PPG Paints Arena for the Penguins. The Penguins, under the ownership of Burkle, are the only North American sports team with ties to private equity that has won a championship.

On January 22, 2019, Burkle was announced as the new lead investor of Sacramento Republic FC. On February 26, 2021, Burkle announced that he was pulling out his interests in Major League Soccer expansion club in Sacramento due to the COVID 19 pandemic in California. This move placed Sacramento expansion hopes in doubt.

In January 2021, Lisa Baird, the commissioner of the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL), announced that an expansion team in Sacramento, led by Ron Burkle and in conjunction with Sacramento Republic FC's expansion bid into Major League Soccer, would join the NWSL in 2022. However, Burkle never confirmed the news publicly before exiting the Sacramento Republic's ownership group. Instead, on June 8, 2021, the NWSL announced San Diego as the location for an expansion team owned by Burkle, which began play as San Diego Wave FC in the 2022 NWSL season.

Burkle has invested in technology startup companies through A Grade Investments, a venture capital fund he founded with Ashton Kutcher and Guy Oseary. As of 2020, A Grade's investment portfolio includes SeatGeek, SoundCloud, Uber, Warby Parker, Spotify, Foursquare, and Airbnb. He has also invested in technology startup companies through Inevitable Venture, a venture capital fund founded by D. A Wallach and Chris Hollod. Inevitable Ventures's investment include Picnic Health, 8i, Thrive Market, and Wiser Care.

In January 2012, Burkle invested in Artist Group International, a concert booking firm whose clients include Billy Joel, Metallica, and Rod Stewart. In March 2013, Burkle invested in a branded entertainment company, Three Lions Entertainment, which focuses on branded entertainment events and cross platform marketing. In 2014, he bought Artist Group International and, through the Paradigm Talent Agency, partnered with London's CODA Music Agency and X ray Touring. That same year, Burkle acquired a minority stake in Independent Talent through Yucaipa fund. In 2018, Burkle's investment firm Yucaipa acquired a minority stake in the Spanish music festival Primavera Sound. In 2020, Burkle made a major investment in the musical festival production Danny Wimmer Presents. On April 5, 2023 it was announced that Burkle along with Anthony Kiedis and Bob Forrest had formed the production company Said and Done Entertainment. Their first project will be an animated series for TBS called Hellicious which is based on the comic book of the same name. Burkle, Kiedis and Forrest will also serve as executive producers on the series.

Burkle has personally contributed millions of dollars to the Democratic Party and raised an estimated $100 million at celebrity studded fundraising events he hosted for Democratic Party candidates at his Green Acres Estate in Beverly Hills, California. Burkle has hosted fundraisers for Bill and Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, as well as former Republican California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger,

In 2004, Burkle helped finance the launch of Al Gore's Current TV, which was sold in January 2013 to Qatar based cable news channel Al Jazeera. During Bill Clinton's presidency, Burkle was a key fundraiser and they became close friends. Clinton invested in a Yucaipa global fund focused on foreign companies.

Burkle's honors and awards include the Los Angeles County, California Boy Scouts Jimmy Stewart "Good Turn" Award, the AIDS Project Los Angeles Commitment to Life Award, and the Los Angeles Urban League Whitney M. Young Award. He has received numerous honors and awards from labor including the AFL CIO Murray Green Meany Kirkland Community Service Award and the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor Man of the Year.

In 1997, Burkle donated $15 million for the construction of Walt Disney Concert Hall.

Burkle is founder and chairman of The Ronald W. Burkle Foundation.

Burkle serves as co chairman of The Ronald W. Burkle Center for International Relations at UCLA, to promote "research on and promotes discussion of international relations, U. S. foreign policy, and complex issues of global cooperation and conflict." The Center has hosted UN Secretary General Ban Ki moon, and former U. S. presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter. the National Urban League, and AIDS Project Los Angeles. He is a past board member of the J. Paul Getty Trust, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Los Angeles Music Center, John F. Kennedy Center for Performing Arts, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. Burkle also hosts events for The Rape Foundation at his Greenacres Estate.

Burkle is a fan of historic architecture. In 2011, he purchased the partially restored Ennis House, a Los Angeles landmark designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. In 2019, Burkle sold the house for $18 million. Burkle owns Greenacres, an estate built for Harold Lloyd. Burkle owns two of entertainer Bob Hope's properties, acquiring his John Lautner designed Palm Springs home for $13 million in 2016 and Toluca Lake, CA home, originally designed by Richard Finkelhor in the 1930s and expanded in the 1950s by John Elgin Woolf, for $15 million in 2017. In December 2013, Burkle purchased an Olympic gold medal won by Jesse Owens at the 1936 Berlin Games for $1.4 million and owns William Faulkner's Nobel Prize for Literature. Burkle owns the Mediterranean styled mansion overlooking the bluffs of Black's Beach on a nearly six acre plot in the La Jolla Farms neighborhood of San Diego, California. It was purchased on February 5, 1999, for $15.3 million and the current tax assessment is $34 million. Burkle has worked with Novak Djokovic, world No.1 tennis player at the time, on strategic marketing and charitable initiatives. In December 2018, the Serbian Government opened a consulate in Montana and Burkle was named honorary consul of Serbia in the US. On account of that, he applied for Serbian citizenship, which Serbian Government accepted and he was formally naturalized on November 25, 2019, making him the third Serbian billionaire after Philip Zepter and Miroslav Mišković, according to Forbes' list. On January 6, 2020, Burkle's son Andrew was found dead in his Beverly Hills Home. In December 2020, Burkle, a former family friend of Michael Jackson, purchased Jackson's former Neverland Ranch property for $22 million as a "land banking opportunity."

In April 2006, Burkle accused New York Post columnist Jared Paul Stern of attempting to extort money from him in exchange for stopping the publication of stories in Page Six, the paper's gossip column, about his private life. He secretly videotaped two private meetings between himself and Stern, with the second meeting orchestrated and monitored by the FBI. Stern allegedly asked Burkle for a $220,000 investment in his clothing business in exchange for better coverage. Stern was subsequently fired by the Post. On April 30, 2008, a Delaware judge dismissed Burkle's lawsuit against Raffaello Follieri, ex boyfriend of actress Anne Hathaway, after Follieri agreed to repay $1.3 million Burkle loaned to him in the Vati Con scandal. In 2018, Follieri, who was deported back to Italy in 2012 after serving 4 1/2 years in prison for the scandal, stated that he and Burkle were once again on good terms and that Burkle was among the group of investors helping him acquire 50 percent in the Foggia Calcio soccer club in Southern Italy. Ronald Burkle's name was found in Jeffrey Epstein’s black book and on Epstein’s private jet log. Burkle took what were described as humanitarian trips to Africa with Bill Clinton on Epstein’s private Boeing 727, sometimes referred to as “the Lolita Express.” Following the Africa trip, Burkle reportedly returned home via a commercial jet, referring to Epstein as "creepy".