Arne Næss, Jr. (8 December 1937 – 13 January 2004) was a Norwegian businessman and mountaineer. He had been married to Diana Ross since 1985, by whom he had two sons, but the couple was long separated at the time of his sudden death.
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Næss was born in Germany in 1937 to Kiki Næss (1907–2001), a Norwegian physiotherapist, and German Raab (1901–1993), a German physician and a Major in the Wehrmacht. Næss' mother, whose maiden name he would adopt as his own surname, was the sister of philosopher and mountaineer Arne Næss. Næss' family lived in Germany during World War II. His parents divorced after the war and he moved to Norway with his mother.
In 1966 he married Filippa Kumlin d'Orey of Sweden, and they had one son and two daughters together, one of whom is folk/pop singer Leona Naess. After the divorce from his first wife, he had a relationship with Norwegian actress Mari Maurstad. In 1985 Næss met American singer Diana Ross on a trip to the Bahamas. He and Ross married in 1985, had two sons, and separated in 1999. The last five years of his life Næss lived together with Camilla Astrup of Oslo, with whom he had two sons.
By age 19 Næss had already made twenty first ascents of Norwegian mountains. He then concentrated on a career in the shipping industry, starting out with his uncle Erling Dekke Næss in 1964 in New York. In the seventies he went back to mountain climbing, and in 1985 he led the first Norwegian expedition to Mount Everest, reportedly one of the more successful Everest climbs to have taken place. Also participating was British mountaineer Chris Bonington.
In a television interview in the late 1990s, being confronted about the risks of mountaineering, Næss told the reporter: "If I hadn't liked risks, I would rather have played tennis or golf."
On 13 January 2004, visiting friends while on a business trip, he died in a climbing accident during descent of a peak in the Groot Drakenstein mountains near the town of Franschoek outside Cape Town, South Africa.
According to police reports, Næss' anchoring equipment loosened from the porous mountainside, leading to a 103 m fall. He was 66 years old. He was survived by seven children, the youngest of whom was born in 2003.