Brian Souter: Charity donations

Charity donors featured for the first time in the list this year, and the most generous was Brian Souter, the Scottish boss of transport company Stagecoach.

Mr Souter, who was listed as the fifth richest person in Scotland, saw his Souter Foundation give 41.1% of its asset base to charity.

Scotland-based author Joanne (JK) Rowling was assessed as ninth in the Scottish Rich list with �226m.

Ms Rowling, who began writing the Harry Potter books when she was an unemployed single mother in Edinburgh, stormed into the top ten after being placed 42nd in 2001.

Bob the builder

Deals which saw her take 1% of all box office takings from the film Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone and 5% of all merchandise from her character, have seen her fortune rise dramatically over the past year.

Children's characters also helped the owners of Dundee-based publishing firm D C Thomson to take seventh place on the list (�267m).

The Thomson family, whose company publishes the Beano comic, has a stake in HIT entertainment which owns Bob the Builder.

Scotland's richest man, Sir Ian Wood, saw his wealth increase by �436m since the 2001 survey.

David Murray: Sixth on list

Sir Ian transformed the Aberdeen fishing group from a family-run ship repair business to a multinational energy services business, hiring 10,000 in 30 countries.

Turnover soared 50% to more than �1bn last year, helped in part by the first full contribution from Mustang, the US deep-water engineering business.

It has diversified out of offshore engineering services and into the maintenance of aero engines and gas turbines.

Other notable entries in the Scottish list include former owner of retail group Sports Division, Tom Hunter, in fourth place with �400m and Rangers chairman David Murray comes in sixth with �300m.