Nowadays, people increasingly equal personal wealth with succes. But can only rich people be called successful? In my opinion, generally speaking, rich people are success.
First and foremost, we must admit that the majority of rich people are successful. Alfred Nobel inventeed Dynamite and became a millionaire.  Bill Gates is famous for hs ability of improving on existing ideas and making the most use of them. Products such as MS-DOS and Windows operating systerm bought him a huge amont of money and even became the richest people in the world for many years. Steve Jobs, formed the Apple Omputer Company, designed and marketed wildly successful products, e.g. i-Mac and i-Pod, which saved the Apple Company from bankruptcy and earned lots of money. Andrew Carnege, one of the mont  influential American industrialists and philanthropists, famously commented, "The man who dies rich dies disgraced.“ These great people created tremendous wealth by eceptional creativeness, vision and courage. They are turely successful people.
On the other hand, there are many exceptions because many great men and women were poor. Vincent van Gogh, one of the most influencial painters and pioneer of Expressionism, sold only one painting in his life time and was impecunious for much of his life. Karl Marx, after being exiled from Germany , moved to London, making a living by contributing to magazines. It was for the support of Engles that Marx could continue his work. These people had lived in poverty not though their own fault but because of misfortune or social illnesses. They were also successful because of their great ideas and works.
In conclusion, there are many successful men who are rich. And exceptions do exist for there are famous people like Vincent van Gogh and Karl Marx. However, in most cases, successful people are rich.