PETALING JAYA: A total of 18 Malaysians have made it to the Forbes World’s Billionaire List for this year.
Their cumulative wealth is US$54.7 billion (RM240.38 billion).
Robert Kuok retains his position as the richest man in Malaysia. His US$11.8 billion portfolio puts him at number 146 on the global list.
He owns Kuok group which has interests in hotels, real estate and commodities.
He is followed by Quek Leng Chan (US$10.1 billion) at 179th and Ananda Krishnan (US$5.2 billion) at 511th.
Quek made his fortune through the Hong Leong Group, which owns a share in Hong Leong Bank, Malaysia’s fourth largest banking group by market capital.
Quek’s cousin Kwek Leng Beng is also a billionaire. He is the chairperson of Hong Leong Group in Singapore.
On the other hand Ananda is known for his multimedia empire which includes Astro and Maxis Communications.
At fourth place locally we have Kooh Poh Keong who founded Press Metal aluminium in 1986 with his four brothers. Today the Press Metal has operations in Europe, the UK, Australia and New Zealand as well as China and the Americas.
A notable absence would be Teh Hong Piow, who was among the 10 richest persons in Malaysia with a net worth of US$5.7 billion on Forbes 2022 list. He passed away in December last year.
Surviving him are his children and new entrants to the list William Teh Lee Pang, Lillian Teh Li Ming, Lillyn Teh Li Hua and Diana Teh Li Shing. Three three daughters’ entry makes them the first Malaysia women to make it to the billionaire list.
Others included two billionaires from the gaming industry — Lim Kok Thay, chairman of the Genting Group and Dr Chen Lip Keong of the Naga Group who holds a casino licence in Cambodia’s capital Phnom Penh.
Notably Chen, who has a medical degree from Universiti Malaya, had a stint as a general practitioner before beginning his business journey.
Another duo on the list is Lee Yeow Chor and Lee Yeow Seng who helm the palm oil and property conglomerate, IOI Group. The brothers inherited IOI from their father Lee Shin Cheng who passed away in 2019.
Among the other bigwigs are Syed Mokhtar Albukhary with a net worth of US$1.6 billion, the bulk of which is from his interests in DRB-Hicom and MMC Corp.
Tan Yu Yeh, the man behind MR DIY, a popular retail chain carrying home products and Jeffrey Cheah, founder and chairman of Sunway Group, also make it to the list.
Some of them may have lost a few million here and there, but they remain firmly on the billionaire list.
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