Ronald Burkle

On January 6, 2020, Burkle's son Andrew was found dead in his Beverly Hills Home.

On January 22, 2019, Burkle was announced as the new lead investor of soon-to-be Major League Soccer franchise, the Sacramento Republic FC.

In December 2018, Serbian Government opened a consulate in Montana and Burkle was named honorary consule 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.

Burkle's net worth is estimated at US$ 2 billion as of February 12, 2018. He had been ranked #633 on Forbes' list of "The Richest People on The Planet 2014."

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.

In January 2011, he hosted a fundraiser to support efforts to overturn Proposition 8, California's ban on same-sex marriage.

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. 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 2009, Bill Clinton ended his relationship with Yucaipa due to potential conflicts of interest. Following "months" of negotiations, the two were not able to agree on a final payment for Clinton's advisory services, estimated at up to $20 million, and Clinton "walked away" from the potential payout.

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 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.

Wild Oats Markets was an operator of natural foods stores and farmers' markets in North America. Burkle started buying Wild Oats stock in February 2005. By the time Whole Foods Market, a natural-foods grocer, agreed to pay $565 million for Wild Oats, Burkle was the largest shareholder of Wild Oats.

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. In 2002, Burkle hired Clinton as a senior advisor on two Yucaipa domestic investment funds. Clinton invested in a Yucaipa global fund focused on foreign companies. In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, then-U.S. Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) expressed concern that such investments could be used by foreign governments as "instruments of foreign policy."

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.

In 1986, Burkle founded Yucaipa Companies, a private equity firm which invests in retail, manufacturing, and distribution.

Ronald Wayne Burkle (born November 12, 1952) is an American billionaire businessman. He is co-founder and managing partner of The Yucaipa Companies, LLC, a private equity and venture capital firm that specializes in underperforming U.S. companies in the distribution, logistics, food, retail, consumer and light industrial sectors.

Ron Burkle was born on November 12, 1952, the elder of two sons, to Betty and Joseph Burkle in Pomona, California. Joseph worked seven days a week, managing a Stater Bros. grocery store in Pomona and investing his savings in apartment buildings. To see his father, Burkle stocked shelves in his father's store with bread and corralled shopping carts.