Lui Che Woo, GBM, MBE, JP (Chinese: 呂志和; Sidney Lau: Lui5 Ji3 Woh6) (born 9 August 1929, Jiangmen, China) is a Hong Kong business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. He is a member of the standing committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, Jiangmen, People’s Republic of China, and is a Hong Kong gambling magnate, founder and chairman of listed firms Galaxy Entertainment Group and K. Wah International Holdings Ltd. As of June 2021, he had an estimated net worth of US$19.0 billion and ranked the fourth richest man in Hong Kong according to Bloomberg Billionaires Index
The majority of Lui’s wealth is derived from a 41% stake in Galaxy Entertainment, a Macau-based, publicly traded casino operator. He also owns 56% of Hong Kong-based K. Wah International, a property developer with businesses in China and Southeast Asia.
His shares in Galaxy and K. Wah are held by him and his family through holding companies and trusts registered in Hong Kong and Liberia. All of these shares are attributed to him because he’s the founder and patriarch of the fortune.
The value of his cash holdings is based on an analysis of dividends, insider transactions, taxes and market performance. It also reflects his stake in Stanford Hotels through closely held conglomerate K. Wah Group. The hospitality business composes of more than one dozen hotels in the US and Hong Kong, including his first hotel, InterContinental Grand Stanford Hong Kong.
Helen Cheung, a spokesperson at K. Wah, declined to comment on the net worth calculation.
Biography
Lui was born in 1929, in the city of Jiangmen in Guangdong province, after his family moved back to China from San Francisco, where they had made a fortune running a laundry. Lui followed his family as they fled war-torn China for Hong Kong in 1934. After graduating from middle school, Japanese troops entered the city. At age 13, Lui began to support his family by selling food on the streets of the British colony.
In the 1950s, Lui began to buy surplus construction equipment from US forces in Okinawa and imported it to Hong Kong. When he couldn’t sell some stone crushers, he started a quarrying business. The 26-year-old then founded K. Wah Group, which has become Hong Kong’s largest quarrying operator, according to the company’s website.
The billionaire next turned to property development, investing in his first residential project in 1962. He began building his first Hong Kong hotel in East Tsim Sha Tsui in 1979. The property was originally a Holiday Inn, and has since been rebranded as the InterContinental Grand Stanford Hong Kong.
When Macau ended the four-decade monopoly of local tycoon Stanley Ho in 2002, Lui’s Galaxy Casino Co., with Sheldon Adelson’s Las Vegas Sands, won one of the three gaming concessions put up by the government. Within a year, the partners had split the license after a falling out over strategy: Adelson wanted to re-create Las Vegas in China, Lui wanted to cater to Asian tastes. StarWorld Macau, where gamblers can bet up to $250,000 a hand, opened across the street from Ho’s Grand Lisboa in 2006. His $1.9 billion, 2,200-room Galaxy Macau resort opened after a two-year delay in 2011.
The nonagenarian has turned his attention to the golf course while his eldest son, Francis, runs his casino business. A younger son, Lawrence, leads the San Francisco-based Stanford Hotels, which owns eight Hiltons, two Sheratons, and three Marriotts in the US. His third son, Alexander, is an executive director of K. Wah International and oversees its Hong Kong properties. His eldest daughter, Paddy, is an executive director of both K. Wah International and Galaxy Entertainment, where his youngest daughter Eileen serves as director of human resources and administration.
Public service
Lui was chair of the Tung Wah Group of Hospitals in 1981–1982.
He also holds posts in various tertiary institutions, including founding honorary president of the University of Hong Kong Foundation of Educational Development and Research, member of the board of trustees of United College of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, honorary member of the court of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, member of the consultative committee of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, honorary life chair of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University Foundation, life honorary chair of Wuyi University board of trustees.
In December 2006, Lui was elected to the small-circle Election Committee, in the hotels subsector, for the third term chief executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region selection process. He has also been a member of the Hong Kong Government’s steering committee on MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conventions and Exhibitions) from 2007.
Philanthropy
In 1999, Lui provided funds for the Stanford University Medical Centre to set up Lui Che Woo Research Laboratory.
In 2002, the Lui Che Woo Awards for CUHK/Cornell Student Exchange Programme in Hospitality Management was established to facilitate academic exchanges of the School of Hotel and Tourism Management.
The construction of the Lui Che Woo Building at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University.
In 2012, a donation was made to the Chinese University of Hong Kong for the establishment of the Lui Che Woo Institute of Innovative Medicine.
In 2015, Lui pledged to donate HK$15.6 million to the Chinese University of Hong Kong to establish the Lui Che Woo Distinguished Young Scholars Award and the Lui Che Woo Distinguished Young Scholars Research Scholarship to support outstanding medical research students to further their studies overseas.
Marking K. Wah Group’s 60th anniversary in 2015, Lui established the Lui Che Woo Prize – Prize for World Civilisation, in Hong Kong, an international prize said to honour and recognise individuals or organisations for, inter alia, “promotion of positive life attitude and enhancement of positive energy”
Support for education and other causes
In recognition of his support for education and contributions to worthwhile causes, Lui has been conferred with a number of honorary degrees. In 2001, he was awarded the degree of Doctor of Laws, Honoris Causa by the University of Victoria. In 2002, Lui was conferred the degree of Doctor of Social Science, Honoris Causa, by the Chinese University of Hong Kong and an honorary University Fellowship by the University of Hong Kong. In 2004, he was awarded the degree of Honorary Doctor of Laws by Concordia University in 2004. In 2005, Lui was awarded the degree of Doctor of Business Administration, Honoris Causa, by the Hong Kong Polytechnic University in 2005, as well as the degree of Doctor of Social Sciences, Honoris Causa, by the University of Hong Kong in 2016
Other achievements
In 1982, Lui was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) by Queen Elizabeth and was appointed as a justice of the peace (JP) in 1986.
In 2005, Lui was also awarded the Gold Bauhinia Star (GBS) for his contributions to the development of Hong Kong.
In 2007, Lui was honoured as the Business Person of the Year at the DHL/South China Morning Post Hong Kong Business Awards.
In 2012, he was awarded the Grand Bauhinia Medal by the HKSAR Government for his significant contribution to Hong Kong
Milestones
- 1929 Lui Che-Woo is born in Jiangmen in southern China.
- 1934 Family flees to Hong Kong after war breaks out in China.
- 1955 Establishes the first K. Wah company in Hong Kong.
- 1981 Opens first Hong Kong hotel in Tsim Sha Tsui East.
- 1985 Ventures into U.S. hotel business by starting Stanford Hotels.
- 2002 Wins one of three gaming concessions in Macau.
- 2005 Lists Galaxy Entertainment Group in Hong Kong.
- 2011 Galaxy Macau, a 2,200-room casino resort, opens after delays.
- 2015 Establishes the Lui Che-Woo Prize for World Civilization
- 2016 Overtakes Sands China as Macau’s market leader.
