MEXICO CITY - MEXICAN billionaire Carlos Slim - by some estimates the world's richest man - launched a US$500 million (S$750 million) health institute on Tuesday aimed at helping Latin America's poor.

Based in Mexico City, the private, nonprofit centre is the latest in a series of charitable efforts by Mr Slim.

The Carso Health Institute - named for Mr Slim's industrial-retail conglomerate Grupo Carso SA - will focus on 'families who are most in need', said institute chairman and Grupo Carso president Marco Antonio Slim, a son of the tycoon.

Few details were disclosed on how the institute will operate in Mexico and other countries, and Mr Slim did not speak at the event.

Mr Slim, a 67-year-old Mexican mogul of Lebanese descent, controls vast international holdings including Telefonos de Mexico SA, which operates more than 90 per cent of the nation's fixed-line phone services.

Forbes magazine listed him in March as the world's second-richest man, with a net worth of US$53 billion (S$79.9 billion).

But in June, Mexican financial Web site Sentido Comun calculated that Slim's fortune had risen to US$67.8 billion, topping Microsoft founder Bill Gates' US$56 billion.

Last month, Mr Slim pledged to donate 250,000 low-cost laptop computers to children by the end of the year and as many as 1 million in 2008. -- AP