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Ho Kwon Ping is the co-founder and executive chairman of Banyan Group.
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Growing up, Ho Kwon Ping never thought he would become a businessman, let alone a hotel tycoon.
“I didn’t always want to be an entrepreneur,” he said CNBC Make It. “It’s just that the few times I started working for other people, it really didn’t work out … I’m quite an individualist. I became an entrepreneur more because of the lack of other ways.”
Today, the 72-year-old is the founder and executive chairman Banyan grouphospitality company with a portfolio of 12 global brands, more than 80 hotels and resorts, as well as spas, galleries and residences in more than 20 countries.
Sunset view from the Mandai Rainforest Resort near the Banyan tree.
Courtesy of Banyan Group.
The Singapore Stock Exchange-listed company raised about S$328 million (about $242 million) in 2023 year. Banyan Group has a market capitalization of S$300 million, according to LSEG.
Formative years
Ho shared something about himself that may surprise some: he was imprisoned when he was young.
He said that his early years were largely defined by a strong desire for social activism.
While working toward his undergraduate degree at Stanford University in the early 1970s, he was an outspoken student activist against the Vietnam War (also known as the “American War” in Vietnam).
He joined other protests on campus — notably against the American inventor and physicist William Shockleywhich eventually got him suspended from the institution.
“I got kicked out because I was involved in the Black Student Union, a protest against a guy called William Shockley, who won the Nobel Prize for semiconductors, but who also had weird views on eugenics. He wrote several books saying that blacks should be sterilized,” Ho said.
As a result, Ho was tried on campus and found guilty of suppressing academic freedom, leading to suspension from the university. He subsequently decided to leave Stanford and returned to Singapore, where he completed his national service and resumed university studies.
“I had to start from scratch and it was very boring, so I started writing as a freelance journalist (for) a now-defunct magazine called the Far Eastern Economic Review,” he said. “I started writing about Singapore’s politics, which the government didn’t like. So I was imprisoned under the Internal Security Act for being pro-communist.’
It was in 1977 and he was placed in solitary confinement during his two-month sentence – a time he describes as “scary, lonely, depressing and sobering”.
Ho Kwon Ping and his wife Claire Chan in 1992.
Courtesy of Banyan Group.
After his release, Ho returned to the magazine as a journalist and moved to Hong Kong with his wife, Claire Chan. The newlyweds moved to a small fishing village on Lamma Island called Yung Shu Wan, which translates as “Banyan Tree Bay”.
“I wasn’t paid very well, so I couldn’t afford to live on Hong Kong Island or Kowloon … so we had no choice but to live on Lama Island,” Ho said. “Although we weren’t rich … we had three very idyllic years there.”
Ho was born in Hong Kong and spent most of his childhood and youth in Thailand before moving to Singapore. his father To Ri Hwawas a businessman who co-founded Thai Wah Public Company and headed the Wah Chang Group, conglomerates operating throughout Asia.
“Even though my parents were pretty well-off, I was always a bit rebellious and wanted to be independent and so on,” he said.
Casual businessman
In 1981, Ho’s father had a stroke. As the eldest son, Ho took on the responsibility of running the family business.
“This business was a true microcosm of overseas Chinese enterprises, which means jack of all trades, but not a master,” Ho said. “We had about 10 to 12 different businesses from construction to contract manufacturing of televisions … even Adidas shoes and so on.”
After several serious failures and lessons in running the family business, Ho had an epiphany – instead of running a “message of businesses”, he wanted to focus on building his own brand.
“Then I decided that contract manufacturing was not a long-term solution. You have to own the customer, and you can only do that by owning the brand or owning the technology, and I’m not a technologist, so I decided we have to own the brand,” he said.
When the “light bulb goes out”
The stars aligned when one day in 1984, Ho came across a huge piece of coastal land in Bang Tao Bay in Phuket, Thailand. According to the company’s official statement, he decided to purchase a site of more than 550 acres, which turned out to be an abandoned tin mine.
After several years of restoration, Ho worked with his wife and brother, who is an architect, to design and develop several hotels and resorts on the property. Laguna Phuket, Asia’s first integrated resort, was opened in 1987, according to a statement.
“We designed the first hotel, and we managed to attract a Thai company to manage it. The second hotel was run by Sheraton, the third, fourth and so on,” said Ho. “And then the last piece of land didn’t have a beach (so) no one wanted to manage it.”
“That’s when the light bulb went off and I said, ‘Well, since no one wants to run it … why don’t we create our own brand?’
A view of a banyan tree in Phuket, Thailand.
Courtesy of Banyan Group.
To compensate for the lack of a beach, Ho decided to build private villas with a pool for each.
“This was 30 years ago, so the concept of an all-pool villa hotel didn’t exist…we also pioneered the ‘tropical spa,'” he said.
In 1994, the group’s flagship luxury resort, Banyan Tree Phuket, opened its doors, including the first Banyan Tree Spa, a name inspired by the happy years Ho spent with his wife at Banyan Tree Bay in Hong Kong.
“Innovation doesn’t fall from the sky … it was a response to a need,” he said.
In 2006, Banyan Tree Holdings Limited debuted on the Singapore Stock Exchange and in 2024, Banyan Group was launched as an umbrella brand for a multi-brand portfolio, the company said in a statement.
“People would ask me if I sold out or not, and I’d say, ‘No, I’ve grown up.’ The things I did cannot continue to be done forever. You’re going to go to jail forever, and you’re not effective,” Ho said. “But what we wanted to do in terms of social change, I think we’re actually doing through Banyan Tree.”
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