Every year since 1983, a group of leading CEOs, founders, and billionaires from various industries have gathered at the Sun Valley Conference, held at the exclusive Sun Valley Lodge in Idaho, under the auspices of investment bank Allen & Co. Many have called the event “summer camp for billionaires.”
But despite the golf games, fly fishing, horseback riding, and conferences featuring startup leaders and experienced Silicon Valley sharks, there’s no singing around the campfire at this camp. In discreet conversations in the corridors, attendees have discussed some of the biggest deals of the past few years.
Illustrious guests. Among the regulars at this camp are Meta CEO and Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy, former PayPal CEO Peter Thiel, Spotify CEO Daniel EK, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Microsoft CEO Sundar Pichai, Disney CEO Bob Iger, and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. These are just some of the names on this year’s guest list, obtained by Variety.
An absence that looks like retirement. This year’s summer camp for billionaires has some significant absences. For the first time since its start, 94-year-old veteran investor Warren Buffett won’t be attending. In his place will be Greg Abel, officially named by the Oracle of Omaha himself as his successor at the helm of Berkshire Hathaway.
Following the death of his 99-year-old partner, Charlie Munger, at the end of 2023, Buffett has accelerated his retirement from the front line of the company he founded. The veteran investor appears to be orchestrating a new step in the transfer of power by skipping one of his favorite annual events.
Elon Musk will also be absent. Tesla CEO Elon Musk will be another notable absence from the 2024 event. The tech mogul has participated in conferences in previous editions, but he is less and less willing to attend these meetings with other Silicon Valley billionaires and influential people.
As Fortune points out, Musk is probably avoiding direct questions that might make him uncomfortable or trying to avoid running into other billionaires like Altman or Gates, with whom he has had a few recent run-ins.
A place for deal-making. A lot has happened within the walls of the Sun Valley Lodge. For example, Bezos and former Washington Post owner Donald Graham negotiated the purchase of the media outlet while on walks at the property. On another occasion, Disney and ABC executives hammered out the final details of their merger at the 1995 camp for billionaires, as the Los Angeles Times reported at the time.
This will be a highly politicized edition. The 2024 edition will be held at a time of particular political relevance. Let's set the scene: There's been a change of government in the UK, the situation regarding the populist ultra-right in France, and a U.S. election complicated by doubts about current president Joe Biden’s health and the judicial issues surrounding former President Donald Trump.
In this context, three governors suggested as replacements for Biden—Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, and Wes Moore of Maryland—plan to attend the event to secure the support of some of world's wealthiest and most influential people. Some might even add their voice to the growing number of people calling on Biden to withdraw from the race after passing through the event.
Image | Sun Valley Resort (Don Collier) | Flickr (Smithsonian Institution) | Wikimedia Commons (GODL-India)
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