Kwok Tak-seng

OBE The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...

(12 March 1911 – 30 October 1990) was a Hong Kong businessman. He was the

founder Founder or Founders may refer to: Places *Founders Park, a stadium in South Carolina, formerly known as Carolina Stadium * Founders Park, a waterside park in Islamorada, Florida Arts, entertainment, and media * Founders (''Star Trek''), the ali ...

Sun Hung Kai Properties Sun Hung Kai Properties Limited (SHKP) is a listed corporation and one of the largest property developers in Hong Kong. The company's businesses include property sales, property rental, telecommunications (SmarTone, SUNeVision), hotel operatio ...

, one of the major

property developer Real estate development, or property development, is a business process, encompassing activities that range from the renovation and re-lease of existing buildings to the purchase of raw Real Estate, land and the sale of developed land or parce ...

s in Hong Kong.

Early life

Kwok was born in Macau. The

ancestral home An ancestral home is the place of origin of one's extended family, particularly the home owned and preserved by the same family for several generations. The term can refer to an individual house or estate, or to a broader geographic area such as a ...

of the Kwok family was located in

Zhongshan Zhongshan ( zh, c=中山 ), alternately romanized via Cantonese as Chungshan, is a prefecture-level city in the south of the Pearl River Delta in Guangdong province, China. As of the 2020 census, the whole city with 4,418,060 inhabitants is n ...

Guangdong ) means "wide" or "vast", and has been associated with the region since the creation of Guang Prefecture in AD 226. The name "''Guang''" ultimately came from Guangxin ( zh, labels=no, first=t, t= , s=广信), an outpost established in Han dynasty ...

, formerly known as Xiangshan. He emigrated to Hong Kong after

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

Career

Kwok partnered with Fung King-hey and

Lee Shau-kee Lee Shau-kee (; 20 February 1928 – 17 March 2025) was a Hong Kong business magnate, investor and philanthropist. He was a real estate tycoon and majority owner of Henderson Land Development, a property conglomerate with interests in prop ...

to establish Sun Hung Kai Enterprises, a predecessor of

in 1963. Sun Hung Kai Properties was publicly listed in Hong Kong in 1972 and soon became one of the top companies listed on the

Stock Exchange of Hong Kong The Stock Exchange of Hong Kong (, SEHK, also known as Hong Kong Stock Exchange) is a stock exchange based in Hong Kong. It is one of the largest stock exchanges in Asia and the 9th largest globally by market capitalization as of August 20 ...

market capitalisation Market capitalization, sometimes referred to as market cap, is the total value of a publicly traded company's outstanding common shares owned by stockholders. Market capitalization is equal to the market price per common share multiplied by ...

. Kwok was appointed OBE in the

1986 Birthday Honours Queen's Birthday Honours are announced on or around the date of the Queen's Official Birthday in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom. The dates vary, both from year to year and from country to country. All are published in suppl ...

. Kwok also served as a non-executive director of fellow developer

New World Development New World Development Company Limited (NWD) is a Hong Kong–based company focused on property, hotels, infrastructure and services and department stores. It was established on 29 May 1970 by Cheng Yu-tung. The company is publicly listed on t ...

Personal life

Kwok married

Kwong Siu-hing Kwong Siu-hing, or sometimes Kwok Kwong Siu-hing (; born 2 December 1929), is the matriarch of the Kwok family. She controls the conglomerate Sun Hung Kai Properties, the largest property developer in Hong Kong as of 2019. As of 2008, Kwong effe ...

. They have three sons,

Walter Kwok Walter Kwok Ping-sheung JP (; Cantonese pronunciation: ; 1950 – 20 October 2018) was a Hong Kong real estate developer. He was the eldest son of Kwok Tak-seng, founder of Sun Hung Kai Properties, and his wife Kwong Siu-hing. Following t ...

Thomas Kwok Thomas Kwok Ping-kwong (; born October 6, 1951) is a Hong Kong billionaire, and the former joint chairman and managing director (with his brother Raymond Kwok) of Sun Hung Kai Properties, the largest property developer in Hong Kong. He receive ...

, and Raymond Kwok. On 30 October 1990, Kwok died of a heart attack. Kwok was 79. Kwok was succeeded as chairman of Sun Hung Kai by his eldest son, Walter. In 2008, after a very public intra-family tussle, his wife Kwong Siu-hing became chairman.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kwok, Tak Seng 1911 births 1990 deaths Hong Kong billionaires Hong Kong businesspeople in real estate New World Development people Officers of the Order of the British Empire