Sir Ian Wood - Facing down Elon Musk and mark Zuckerberg and the Worlds Billionaires
- Raymond Smith
- 1 day ago
- 5 min read
Extracted from the Book- Aberdeens Billionaire - Sir Ian Wood
When Sir Ian Wood made his speech at Bill Gates's Billionaire event, he seized an opportunity to give it to the American Billionaires with both Barrels. He didn't shrink behind the podium, and told them what they really needed. the speech was really intended to help Bill Gates and Warren Buffet recruit some of those wealthy famous famous faces in the room to the Charity cause. Below is an extract from his speech.
Extracted from the Book- Aberdeens Billionaire - Sir Ian Woodet aw
Every year at the Just Giving event, the latest cohort of billionaire recruits joining the Giving Pledge are introduced, setting an example for those yet to join. Sir Ian, elegantly dressed in a black-tie dinner suit, took a seat at his table. Among those familiar faces sat at his table were his Scottish friends, Sir Tom and his wife, Lady Marion Hunter.. Much like Sir Ian, Sir Tom Hunter had been a pioneer in the realm of philanthropy. In the mid-2000s, well before such commitments became fashionable, he decided to donate his fortune to noble causes rather than let it dissipate through inheritance and Tax after his death. Influenced by the profound legacy of Andrew Carnegie, Sir Tom, like Sir Ian, held a deep admiration for Carnegie's words, beliefs, and accomplishments, often sharing stories about him at various events and when opportunities suited. Both Sir Tom and Sir Ian had embarked on a number of philanthropic visits to Rwanda and sub-Saharan Africa together.
Sir was now standing at a podium in a room looking at 80 of the richest and most famous people on earth. He took out his Speech which was handwritten and placed it on the Podium. He was a little nervous but didn’t show it. He had wanted to run through his speech with Bill Gates prior as he thought it may be a little close to the bone in some areas for the assembled gathering, Bill simply told him, the Speech is yours and you say it as it needs to be said.
Sir Ian started his speech with an insult:
American billionaires don't do enough to help the underprivileged outside the United States. Billionaire Americans don't spend enough of their money on international causes. He went on to say while getting animated and raising his hand, “Charity must not end at home”, 50% of the world’s population face a completely different scale of hardship and suffering from those in the western world, and more than 2.9 million children die every year from malnutrition, pneumonia and Diarrhoea accounting for around a quarter of those deaths. Globally 340 million children have no access to education of any kind, and I mean no education, across the world 800 million people live in extreme poverty and that’s three and a half times the population of the United States. 270 million people in sub–Saharan Africa are undernourished, yet half of the world's uncultivated agriculture lies on that continent. That was our opportunity to make a difference. The Wood foundation chose the tea industry in Tanzania and Rwanda because we found that tens of thousands of smallholder tea farmers were being exploited by the big tea estates, with the farmers lucky to be earning $1.50 per day farming tea on a hectare of land, their land, and the best they could do was get $1.50 a day. Their sole ambition was to get enough money to feed their families, with education for the children being a bonus if they could afford it. Our charity has had a major sustainable impact on over 100,000 farmers, incomes have quadrupled for those farmers, and doubled for the support labour working the fields, and our charity is now making available and planting 15000 hectares of tea for the farmers there. Our Charity is about helping people to help themselves. We are working to do things so people can help themselves in a long-term sustainable way. We hosted with the local leaders two celebrations called Barrachers, which was their way of saying thank you. Sir Ian went on to state how he knew Americans were the most generous philanthropists in the world, but “and it’s a very big but” only 5% of your philanthropy goes outside the US. 95% is focused internally. My question: Why such a small proportion for the much less fortunate members of humanity in the developing countries? I know there’s the challenge of working in different countries, cultures, but it’s possible and there's a big plus that we can have a transformative impact on regions and communities. You then have a huge impact and ability to transform many thousands of lives, frankly the older generation around the world have not been good at accepting the concept of global responsibility, were not doing a great job of enhancing the harmony and prosperity and wellbeing of mankind, somehow the overseeing of global problems is always somebody else’s problems to solve. Bill Gates says it very well, we should all judge ourselves not just on how we are looking after our planet, and it eco systems, but in how well we help looking after the impoverished, sick and downtrodden people, who are a world away from us, who have nothing in common with us except they are fellow human beings. I would urge you all to just give some consideration: - to how you may better apply the donations you give. When I state better applied: $1 spent in the very poor areas, has a much greater impact than if you give that dollar at home. And with that Sir Ian left the stage to a rousing applause.
The just Giving pledge group is the most exclusive group in the world, some of its membership is listed below.
Bill Ackman, Paul Allen Microsoft co-founder (Deceased), HRH Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, Lord Ashcroft KCMG PC, Steve Bing (Deceased), Sara Blakely, Michael Bloomberg, David G. Booth, Richard and Joan Branson, Warren Buffett, John Caudwell, Brian Chesky Founder of Airbnb, Larry Ellison, founder ORACLE Systems, Melinda Gates, Bill Gates, Dame Ann Gloag, Sheryl Sandberg COO Facebook, William Gross, Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou Easy jet Founder, Harold Hamm, Nick and Leslie Hanauer, David and Claudia Harding, Reid Hoffman Founder of LinkedIn, Carl Icahn Billionaire Corporate Raider (One of the character Inspirations for Wall Street’s Gordon Gekko), Elon Musk, David Rockefeller, Jeff and Marieke Rothschild, David M. Rubenstein, David Sainsbury, John and Ginger Sall, Ted Turner(Deceased), Mark Zuckerberg to name but a few.
EXTRACTED FROM THE BIOGRAPHY - SIR IAN WOOD ABERDEENS BILLIONAIRE
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Billionaire industrialist Sir Ian Wood stands as the wealthiest homegrown founder of a company in Scotland. When he stepped down from the helm in 2013, his creation—Wood Group plc—had grown into a global powerhouse valued at $12 billion, operating in more than 60 countries, employing 60,000 people, and elevating his personal fortune to over £2 billion.
A figure both formidable and fiercely debated, Sir Ian Wood’s life unfolds as an extraordinary saga—one marked by relentless effort, unwavering determination, profound personal sacrifice, moments of tragedy, brushes with disaster, and the darker currents of betrayal, greed, immense wealth, and influence.
Beginning with his family’s modest fishing-boat repair business in 1967, he boldly steered the company into the emerging world of oil and gas just as the industry reached Britain’s shores in the 1970s. From there, he built a sprawling empire that touched shipping, energy, fishing, technology, travel, electronics, power generation, offshore drilling, and property development. His leadership oversaw the most dramatic industrial transformation Aberdeen had ever seen.
Now, for the first time, the story long hidden behind closed doors is revealed. This is an explosive, deeply revealing journey into the sometimes shadowy, often ruthless, yet undeniably electrifying world of the Aberdeen oil and gas sector—its power brokers, its high-stakes decisions, and the man whose influence shaped an era.
Sir Ian’s real-life ascent makes HBO’s Succession seem like little more than a gentle bedtime tale.
His achievements stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the greatest entrepreneurs in any industry, at any point in history.
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