One of the interesting things about owning shares in 420 companies is that you get deluged with annual reports that can be perused to see how exactly how rich the boards and managements have become through the current stockmarket boom.

The BRW Rich List is populated with plenty of founder chairs and CEOs, but there aren’t too many professional CEOs who pass the inflated $180 million cut-off. Babcock & Brown’s Phil Green is the stand-out example, followed by Macquarie Bank’s Allan Moss.

Former Brambles CEO Gary Pemberton made about $200 million out of Billabong but he came in as non-executive chairman and has since retired. Chris Corrigan at Patrick Corp is another, but he’s now living the high life in Italy.

One emerging name that few Crikey readers will know is Richard Leupen, the CEO of engineering, rail and infrastructure company United Group.

Leupen caught my eye when he personally wrote out a cheque for $3 million to participate in a recent United Group capital raising at $17 a share. The stock closed yesterday at $17.65, valuing it at $2.8 billion.

The bloke must have some cash, so I was looking forward to seeing the annual report. Well, it arrived yesterday and there’s no doubt Leupen is one of the richest non-founder CEOs going around.

He joined the company as CEO in October 2000 after a career as an engineer that included stints with BHP and Shell. United was going nowhere as its shares had plunged from $4 to barely $1 in the previous 30 months.

Leupen has completely turned the ship around and is the happy owner of 3.944 million ordinary shares which are worth $70 million and has an additional 2.1 million options to buy shares worth $37 million. These are currently in the money by more than $15 million.

No one is complaining about his total pay packet rising from $2.77 million to $4.3 million in the last financial year given that United Group’s profits and share price have soared since he joined.

And unlike banks or retail companies, which just rip off Australians or sell stuff that other people make, United Group has transformed into a global company that operates in 17 countries and has 20,000 employees offshore.

Well done to Richard Leupen and his board, led by chairman Trevor Rowe. Australia needs more success stories like United Group and the CEO deserves to retire when his contract expires in September 2011 with a net worth well in excess of $100 million.