John de Mol
From Television Wiki
- For his son, the actor, see Johnny de Mol.
| John de Mol | |
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| Born | Johannes Hendrikus Hubert de Mol April 24, 1955 Hilversum, Netherlands |
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| Residence | Blaricum, Netherlands |
| Nationality | Dutch |
| Net worth | ▬ US$ 2.2 billion [1] |
| Known for | Founding Endemol Founding Talpa Media Group |
| Spouse(s) | Willeke Alberti (1976–1980) |
| Children | Johnny de Mol |
| Relatives | Linda de Mol |
Johannes "John" Hendrikus Hubert de Mol (born April 24, 1955 in Hilversum) is a Dutch media tycoon and billionaire. In 2005, Forbes magazine named him as one of the 500 richest people in the world. De Mol is one of the men behind production companies Endemol and Talpa.
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Endemol
De Mol, a well known personality in the Netherlands, acquired his fortune producing television programmes. In 1997-1999 he developed the highly popular reality television series Big Brother with his own production company John de Mol Produkties. In 1994 his company merged with Joop van den Ende TV-Producties into Endemol, but it still functioned on its own. He also produced Love Letters, 1 vs. 100 and Deal or No Deal (Miljoenenjacht) for Endemol. De Mol sold his share of Endemol in 2000 to Telefonica, but continued to serve as creative director until 2004.
In May 2007 De Mol returned as one of the main share holders of Endemol together with the Italian company Mediaset of Silvio Berlusconi in a 2.6 billion Euro deal.
Talpa
In 2005 de Mol founded a new television channel Talpa, which acquired the broadcasting rights for Honour division (the name of the dutch premier league football) and also produced the popular show Expedition Robinson. A number of the previously mentioned programmes appeared on Talpa.
The name Talpa is the Latin word for mole (the animal), mol in Dutch, which refers to the surname of John de Mol. Talpa had its official opening night on August 13, 2005. First Talpa only broadcasted in the evenings, since it shared its channel with Nickelodeon. Since December 16, 2006 Talpa had its own channel and broadcasted 24/7.
After a while, the channel was named: Tien. But after bad watch results, Tien was sold to the RTL group in 2007, who named the channel RTL8. The broadcasting rights for the Eredivisie were sold to RTL too, and match summaries were broadcasted on RTL4 until the end of the 2007/08 season.
Private life
De Mol was formerly married to singer and actress Willeke Alberti. The actor Johnny de Mol is their son.
From 1979 to 1982, he had a love affair with Marga Scheide, member of the girl group Luv'.
Outside of television, De Mol controls a large private equity fund which owned significant shares of auto manufacturer Spyker Cars, football team Manchester United and telecommunications company Versatel.
John's sister, actress Linda de Mol, appears in and presents some of his programmes, including the original Dutch version of Deal or No Deal What actually is called Miljoenen jacht(millions hunt). She also presented one of Endemols first productions The DJ Kat Show.
See also
- List of Dutch by net worth
References
- ↑ "#432 John de Mol". www.forbes.com. Forbes. 2007-08-03. http://www.forbes.com/lists/2007/10/07billionaires_John-de-Mol_FDMS.html. Retrieved on 28 August 2007.
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