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Gabe Newell is worth $1.5 billion

And Valve is worth over $3 billion.

Valve boss Gabe Newell is worth an eye-watering $1.5 billion.

He is the 854th richest billionaire, out of a global total of 1226 billionaires, according to Forbes.

Newell owns over 50 per cent of Valve, the company he co-founded in 1996 after leaving Microsoft.

The success of Valve's digital platform Steam (over 40 million users) and hit game Portal 2 helped propel the influential game industry veteran into Forbes' list of the world's billionaires.

How did it calculate Newell's gargantuan earnings? It consulted with industry insiders, equity analysts, investment bankers and technology analysts to work out how much Valve is worth. The most conservative estimate is over $3 billion. And since Newell owns more than half the company, he's worth at least $1.5 billion.