Li Ka-shing Biography

Li Ka-Shing was born on June 13, 1928 in Chaozhou, Guangdong, China. While Li was in elementary school, it was a common occurrence for the Japanese to drop bombs on Chaozhu, so his family took refuge in Hong Kong. Li's father was a school principal, but tragically succumbed to tuberculosis shortly after the family arrived and settled in their new adopted home country.

Li was also infected with tuberculosis. The isolation during this recovery, coupled with such extreme poverty and feelings of helplessness, had a deep impact on Li Ka-Shing. Dealing with a war, the loss of a parent, severe illness, and poverty all before the age of 15, instilled a lifelong drive to succeed beyond into the future tycoon.At 17 years old, Li Ka-shing left his studies to sell watches in the store of his uncle. Quickly he becomes the best seller and at the age of 19, he is hired by a company to sell various metal items. Seller the day, he also works the night to monitor the manufacturing process. This job allows him to control the operation of a factory and the product’s commercialization. In 1947, Li Ka-shing borrows some money to his family and begin selling artificial flowers. He creates a factory for the production and hires the best salesmen. The notoriety of the firm increases and Li Ka-shing signs profitable contracts. In a few years,he becomes the biggest provider of artificial flowers in Asia. In the sixties, the Cultural Revolution moves lot of people to leave the country and the real estate’ price drop sharply. Li Ka-shing is convinced that prices will go up so he decides to buy a lot of lands. In 1971, he creates the real estate company Cheung Kong. In a few years, the businessman appears like “the strong man of the real estate” in Hong Kong. Front of the globalization, he begins to invest in ports. In 1979, Li Ka-shing takes the control of Hutchison Whampoa Limited which he holds 22%. From that time on, starts a rapid expansion which allows HWL to establish in Rotterdam and Panama. The group becomes the first global port operator.  By 1987, Li had transformed himself from factory worker to full fledged billionaire. That same year, Li and his partners paid $500 million to acquire roughly half of Husky Oil, a Canadian company that consistently lost money and had been through many restructurings and mergers. The timing of this acquisition could not have been any more perfect. At the time of the purchase, a barrel of oil traded for roughly $10. Over the next thirty years, a single barrel rose from $10, to $30, to $50 to an all time high of $140. Today, a single barrel of oil sells for $93 which helps Husky Energy generate over $25 billion a year in revenue. Li still has a stake in the company which is worth over $8 billion on its own.

World Richest Person:Throughout his life, Li continued to invest in real estate and a diverse range of other industries. Li's companies handle 70% of Hong Kong's port traffic, have huge stakes in the electric companies and mobile phone services—in a way, you could say he controls Hong Kong from the top of his tower. But beyond real estate, Li Ka-Shing has shown an uncanny perception for the tech-world. The octogenarian took about five minutes in late 2007 to decide to invest $120 million in Facebook. Keep in mind that back in 2007, Facebook barely made any money. It had only recently opened up to membership beyond college students, and Myspace had just proven to be a disastrous investment for Rupert Murdoch's Newscorp. Today, that 0.8% stake in Facebook is worth $900 million.Li also invested in Skype in 2005 when it was losing money. A year later, eBay paid $2.5 billion for it. Li also backed Siri, which, as we all know was bought by Apple in 2010. Li is also invested millions of dollars into Spotify, Waze and HzO. Oh and by the way, after he invested in Spotify, he reportedly told the company Spotify needed to be in his car. This was 2009, long before Spotify had a mobile app. Li's technology investments display a particular brilliance with understand not just where the tech world is, but where it is going. He believes in technology that is a game changer. Things like Facebook, Waze, Siri, etc.But Li still invests in more traditional business as well. In fact in 2010, Li Ka-Shing's Cheung Kong made its biggest acquisition to date when it bought U.K. Power Networks for $9.1 billion. This means that Li now supplies about eight million Brits with power. In 2011, Li bought Northumbrian Water, which ferries clean drinking water to 4.5 million people in England and provides sewerage services to another 2.7 million.Basically, wherever you look, Li Ka-Shing is there in some way. Or so it seems. When Li's tech investments don't pan out, he personally takes the financial hit. When the tech investments hit a windfall, he puts the profits into his Li Ka-Shing Foundation, which he refers to as his third son. The foundation has donated more than $1.6 billion, mostly to education. He has given $690 million to create Shantou University. He donated $40 million to Berkeley for a new biomedical research facility.At 83, he is still quite a force to be reckoned with. Every day, Li practices golf for 90 minutes and by lunchtime he has typically read through every single major international newspaper from back to front. He wakes up each morning at 5am and lives in the same home he bought more than 50 years ago. Li-Ka Shing is press shy and rarely grants interviews but his wealth is legendary in Hong Kong, and globally. He has two sons, and his eldest, Victor is the heir apparent. His younger son Richard runs his own telecom business. Li's wife died of a heart attack in 1990 when she was 56-years old. He never remarried.Today, thanks largely to his majority stakes in Cheung Kong, Hutchison Whampoa and various other investment, Li-Ka Shing is worth $30 billion. That's far and away enough to make him the richest person in Asia and the 18th richest person in the world! Not bad for a former dirt poor factory worker!