The world's biggest privately held packaging and paper firm, Visy Industries, is led by Australian businessman and billionaire Anthony Joseph Pratt (Pratt Industries USA in the US; born 11 April 1960). He is the son of Jeanne Pratt AC, a philanthropist, and Richard Pratt, a former businessman and president of the Carlton Football Club. Pratt and his family had a net worth of $24.3 billion, according to the 2023 Australian Financial Review Rich List. The Australian estimated his family's net worth in 2022 to be A$27.7 billion, Forbes estimated it to be US$12 billion, and each of these organisations listed his sisters' fortune separately.
Early Life ,Career And Education
Pratt was born in Melbourne, Victoria to Polish-Jewish immigrants Richard Pratt and Jeanne Pratt AC. In 1982, he received his Bachelor of Economics (Hons) from Monash University in Melbourne. Prior to joining Visy as joint general manager of its board in 1983, Pratt worked as a management consultant for McKinsey & Co. He was appointed vice-chairman of Visy Industries in 1988. He relocated to the US three years later to oversee the business's US expansion. Through greenfield projects and the purchase of other corrugated manufacturing firms, which today make up the core of Pratt Industries, the company's revenues and profitability increased 15-fold over the ensuing 15 years. From US$100 million in 1991 to US$3 billion in 2016, the company's sales increased. Pratt Industries increased their position from 46th to 5th in terms of corrugated box production throughout that time. It is the only significant paper container board manufacturer that uses completely recycled materials.
Following the passing of his father, Richard, in 2009, Pratt went to Australia to assume the position of executive chairman of Visy, even though he continues to serve as chairman of the American division of the family's packaging company. Between 2009 and 2011, Visy's score on the business reputation index rose from position 43 to position three. Michael Bloomberg, who was the mayor of New York City at the time, gave Pratt a proclamation designating September 17 as Pratt Industries Day in 2013. The RISI North American Packaging CEO of the Year Award went to Pratt in 2016. In the same year, Pratt constructed a paper plant in Chicago that used only recycled materials, increasing his wealth by roughly $1 billion. Then-Gov. Mike Pence gave it a formal opening.
Pratt is involved with charitable organisations both in Australia and the US. He is on the National Board of the Muhammad Ali Centre in Louisville, Kentucky. He made arrangements for Muhammad Ali's visits to Australia in 1998 for the Australian Football League championship game and again in 1999. More recently, Pratt gave $2 million to the Ali Centre to continue promoting Ali's legacy on what would have been Ali's 80th birthday. Pratt is a part of the Climate Group, a global environmental organisation that Tony Blair, a former British prime minister, created. Both Ted Turner's Captain Planet Foundation and Mikhail Gorbachev's Global Green USA have recognised him for his contributions.
Net worth
Following the passing of his father earlier that year, Pratt first featured on the Financial Review (AFR) Rich List in 2009 (at the time known as the BRW Rich 200). With a net worth of A$4.3 billion, he became Australia's richest man for the first time. His fortune grew over the years, but others with connections to the then-rapidly expanding Australian resources industry began to dominate the list.