King Slide chairman Lin Congji tops Taiwan rich list with $16.7 billion fortune

Forbes’ real-time billionaire rankings on Aug. 11 put King Slide Works chairman Lin Congji at the top of Taiwan’s rich list with an estimated net worth of $16.7 billion, or about NT$538.7 billion. The 85-year-old industrialist moved ahead of Yageo chairman Pierre Chen and Hon Hai founder Terry Gou, according to the report. His rise has been tied not to chips or consumer electronics, but to server rack rails, a niche hardware component that has become increasingly important as AI servers grow heavier and more expensive. The report traces Lin’s path from a furniture factory apprentice in Kaohsiung to the founder of King Slide in 1986. A major turning point came in 2001, when the company won an emergency trial order of about $100,000 from Compaq after another supplier ran into design trouble. That order helped push King Slide into the global server supply chain. The article also highlighted the company’s recent financial performance, including a 87.42% gross margin in the second quarter of 2026, first-half net profit of NT$10.574 billion, and revenue of NT$22.687 billion in the first seven months of the year.