Sergey Brin /

Sergey Mikhaylovich Brin (Russian: Сергей Михайлович Брин; born August 21, 1973) is a Russian American computer scientist and industrialist who, with Larry Page, co-founded Google, the world's largest Internet company , based on its search engine and online advertising technology. As of 2011, his personal wealth is estimated to be $19.8 billion. Brin immigrated to the United States from Russia at the age of six. Earning his undergraduate degree at the University of Maryland, he followed in his father's and grandfather's footsteps by studying mathematics, double-majoring in computer science. After graduation, he moved to Stanford to acquire a Ph.D in computer science. There he met Larry Page, with whom he later became friends. They crammed their dormitory room with inexpensive computers and applied Brin’s data mining system to build a superior search engine. The program became popular at Stanford and they suspended their PhD studies to start up Google in a rented garage. The Economist magazine referred to Brin as an "Enlightenment Man", and someone who believes that "knowledge is always good, and certainly always better than ignorance".