25. DATUK TAN HENG CHEW Flagship: Tan Chong Motor Holdings Bhd Net worth: RM2.36bil

THE Tan family, which is known for its distributorship of the

Nissan marque in the South-East

Asian region and China, climbed six rungs with their fortunes gaining some 2% last year.

Heng Chew, the eldest of the seven sons of Tan Sri Tan Yuet

Foh, a co-founder of the group, is the president of the group’s prized asset – Tan Chong Motor Holdings Bhd (TCM).

Heng Chew and family hold a direct 7.6% stake in TCM and an indirect 39.3% stake through Tan Chong Consolidated Sdn Bhd (TCC), the family’s holding company.

Of Heng Chew’s three sons, his youngest, Anthony Tan is the only one who struck out on his own and is now one of the region’s most well-known entrepreneurs, having co-founded popular ride-hailing service provider, Grab.

Earlier this month, Grab obtained another round of funding from Softbank’s tech fund – a US$1.5bil boost – pushing up the company’s valuation to a whopping US$14bil.

At Tan Chong, 2018 was a year of mixed fortunes where it revealed plans to set up assembly plants to accommodate growth expectations.

Also in the same year, it lost the rights to import and distribute Nissan cars in Vietnam starting September this year but formed a new joint venture in New York that will allow it to come up with new distribution channels in the US and Canada.

Financial-performance wise,TCM staged a turnaround when it recorded a net profit of RM51.56mil for the fourth quarter ended Dec 31, 2018 from a previous net loss of RM7.19mil.

Revenue increased slightly to RM1.17bil from RM1.08bil in the same quarter of the previous year.

For the full year, the company recorded a net profit of RM101.03mil from a net loss of RM88.6mil previously.