March 9, 2012 | 10:56 AM | By

D.C.’s Lone Billionaire

The rich are richer in D.C. than in other large cities, but the District isn’t teeming with billionaires, either. Out 1,226 billionaires around the world, only one calls D.C. his home: Steven Rales, co-founder of manufacturing company Danaher. With a net worth of $3.3 billion, Rales comes in at number 344 on Forbes’ annual list of billionaires.


Co-founder of manufacturing and technology company Danaher, Steven Rales, along with brother Mitchell, left his father’s real estate firm in 1979 and started buying small manufacturing companies during the junk bond frenzy of the 1980s. The result was Equity Group Holdings, co-founded with his billionaire brother. The brothers acquired a crippled REIT, and fused it with other industrial companies to form Danaher, named after the Montana stream where they once fished for trout. They took the industrial pump maker Colfax public in 2008. In January, Colfax finalized a $2.4 billion deal to buy British welding, cutting and automation company Charter International. Steven is now chairman of the board of Danaher. He is reportedly a dedicated supporter of the Washington Ballet and DePauw University. He also founded a film production company in Santa Monica, Calif., Indian Paintbrush, which produced Wes Anderson’s “The Darjeeling Limited”, “Fantastic Mr. Fox” and the upcoming “Moonrise Kingdom.”

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