20 GOH PENG OOI
Flagship: Silverlake Axis Ltd Net worth: RM2.99bil GOH founded Silverlake Axis in 1989 and built the group to become a leading provider of universal banking solutions, with a presence in 20 countries across the Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa.
It was listed on Singapore Exchange Limited’s (SGX) secondary board Sesdaq in 2003 and moved up to the SGX Main Board in 2011.
The 64-year-old Goh, who is Silverlake Axis’ executive chairman, is also known as Malaysia’s very first tech billionaire.
In 2017, Goh’s net worth strengthened by nearly 5%, even as he dropped to the 20th rank among the top-40 richest Malaysians.
Over 40% of the top-20 largest banks in South-East Asia run Silverlake Axis’ core banking solution. Today, Silverlake Axis is the core system platform partner of choice for three of the five largest Asean super regional financial institutions.
Last year, it was reported that Silverlake Axis was eyeing three Silverlake private entities in Malaysia.
Goh owns an equity interest of approximately 70% in each of the Silverlake entities – Silverlake Digital Economy, Silverlake Digitale and Silverlake One Paradigm – through Silverlake Investment.
Upon the acquisition, the three companies will effectively become wholly owned subsidiaries of Silverlake Axis. The takeover is aimed at further strengthening Silverlake Axis’ financial technology (fintech) capabilities, and to provide more product offerings in the digital economy.
At the end of 2017, Silverlake Axis had a market capitalisation of S$1.52bil and a share price of S$0.58 per unit. The stock has appreciated by 19% throughout the year.
Silverlake Axis’ financial perfor- mance has taken a beating in recent times, as customers deferred and reduced information technology capital expenditures amidst uncertainties in the regional economies.
However, the company remains positive for a better performance moving forward, as customer sentiment improves in tandem with global economic recovery.
Looking at its balance sheet, Silverlake Axis had a strong net cash position of RM562.4mil as of Sept 30, 2017.
Backed by this, Silverlake Axis has said that it is evaluating suitable acquisition opportunities to expand its portfolio of fintech and Insuretech software products and services to address the growing demand for transformational digital banking and insurance offerings.