Chinese business magnate Zong Qinghou (宗慶后), whose leading beverage firm once made him the richest person in the country, died yesterday, his company said.
He was 79.
Zong was the founder of the Wahaha Group Co (娃哈哈集團), which specializes in bottled water, soft drinks, tea and other products.
Photo: Bloomberg
He died yesterday morning after “treatment for an illness proved ineffective,” the company said in an obituary on a Chinese microblogging site.
A memorial service for Zong is to be held on Wednesday at the company’s offices in the eastern city of Hangzhou, the statement said.
Chinese state media reported last week that Zong was receiving hospital treatment, but gave no details of his illness.
Zong went into business in his 40s, selling soft drinks to children and reportedly being so short of cash that he slept under a bridge in Beijing because he could not afford a hotel.
He established Wahaha in 1987 and built it into a beverage giant whose drinks are a fixture in shops and kiosks across China.
In 2010, Zong was listed by Forbes magazine as China’s richest person with a US$8 billion fortune.
Its estimate last year put him in 53rd place nationally with a net worth of US$5.9 billion.
The tycoon previously voiced support for lowering taxes as a strategy for boosting investment, telling reporters in 2013 that China’s growing wealth inequality was not a problem.
“If we had egalitarianism... we wouldn’t have enough to eat,” Zong said at the time. “It’s best to encourage people to create wealth.”
In recent years, Wahaha — whose name means “Laughing Child” in Chinese — has branched out into various other sectors including baby milk and clothing.
In 2021, Zong took a step back from frontline work, appointing his daughter Zong Fuli (宗馥莉), also known as Kelly Zong, as Wahaha’s vice chairperson and president.
Intel Corp chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) is expected to meet with Taiwanese suppliers next month in conjunction with the opening of the Computex Taipei trade show, supply chain sources said on Monday. The visit, the first for Tan to Taiwan since assuming his new post last month, would be aimed at enhancing Intel’s ties with suppliers in Taiwan as he attempts to help turn around the struggling US chipmaker, the sources said. Tan is to hold a banquet to celebrate Intel’s 40-year presence in Taiwan before Computex opens on May 20 and invite dozens of Taiwanese suppliers to exchange views
Application-specific integrated circuit designer Faraday Technology Corp (智原) yesterday said that although revenue this quarter would decline 30 percent from last quarter, it retained its full-year forecast of revenue growth of 100 percent. The company attributed the quarterly drop to a slowdown in customers’ production of chips using Faraday’s advanced packaging technology. The company is still confident about its revenue growth this year, given its strong “design-win” — or the projects it won to help customers design their chips, Faraday president Steve Wang (王國雍) told an online earnings conference. “The design-win this year is better than we expected. We believe we will win
Chizuko Kimura has become the first female sushi chef in the world to win a Michelin star, fulfilling a promise she made to her dying husband to continue his legacy. The 54-year-old Japanese chef regained the Michelin star her late husband, Shunei Kimura, won three years ago for their Sushi Shunei restaurant in Paris. For Shunei Kimura, the star was a dream come true. However, the joy was short-lived. He died from cancer just three months later in June 2022. He was 65. The following year, the restaurant in the heart of Montmartre lost its star rating. Chizuko Kimura insisted that the new star is still down
While China’s leaders use their economic and political might to fight US President Donald Trump’s trade war “to the end,” its army of social media soldiers are embarking on a more humorous campaign online. Trump’s tariff blitz has seen Washington and Beijing impose eye-watering duties on imports from the other, fanning a standoff between the economic superpowers that has sparked global recession fears and sent markets into a tailspin. Trump says his policy is a response to years of being “ripped off” by other countries and aims to bring manufacturing to the US, forcing companies to employ US workers. However, China’s online warriors
RSS