A number of people living in or with links to the North West have featured in this year’s Sunday Times Rich List which has just been published.
Overall, the combined wealth of Ireland’s richest 300 people is €77 billion.
But within the North West alone, there’s also some massively wealthy individuals.
Donegal-born 79-year old Paddy McNally is at Number 20 on the Rich List with an estimated wealth of €718m.
The former Autosport journalist retired in 2011 from the Formula One hospitality business that made his fortune.
He then started Geneva-based Allsport to handle the trackside advertising at F! circuits and ran the Paddock CLub, which caters for VIPs at F1 events.
Charles Gallagher and family, who are involved in construction, are at Number 25, with a worth of €485m.
The business was built by the Gallaghers’ late father, also Charles, one of a family from County Sligo with close links to Tubbercurry.
Fifty-six year old Philip O’Doherty is into electronics and is worth €201m.
Based in Dubai, he runs E&I Engineering Ireland, a Burnfoot, Co Donegal manufacturer of electrical boards and trunking.
Eileen Monahan, from Sligo, and family is worth €199m. She holds a 20% stake worth €127m in Doyle Hotels (Holdings). With her solicitor husband Ray, she has a property portfolio that includes Sligo’s Johnston’s Court Shopping Centre.
Donegal superstar musician and singer Enya is worth €117 million.
Another Donegal person, 62-year old Tim Kelly, is worth €96m. He’s into telecoms and utilities and runs Harrow-based Kelly Communications and Kelly Integrated.
Donegal-born Seamus Shields and Daniella Shields are worth €58m. They own Glasgow-based Advance Construction Group.
Karl McHugh, worth €62m, is head of the family from Killybegs that owns an 85% stake worth more than €56m in Atlantic Dawn Unlimited, one of Europe’s leading suppliers of frozen pelagic fish.
And Donagh Kelly, a 2015 National Rally Champion from Donegal, owns half of the €109m KN Networks that provides pipeline services to the telecom and energy sectors.
He is said to be worth €54m.
