PANHANDLERS

The Al craze has made former energy secretary and Texas governor Rick Perry rich-and his son, Griffin, a billionaire-thanks to a data center in north Texas that hasn't even been built yet.

- GIACOMO TOGNINI.

Griffin Perry, 42, was 17 years old when his father, Rick, became governor of Texas in 2000. Now father and son are business partners in a real estate investment trust planning to build an enormous data center in the Texas panhandle.

Just nine months after founding Fermi America alongside Toby Neugebauer (the son of former GOP congressman Randy Neugebauer), the trio took the company public on the Nasdaq in October, raising $683 million at a $12.5 billion valuation.