Rich List 2017 Billionaires
98 £ 1.32bn £ 195 m ▲
TONY LANGLEY
EngineeringLangley, 62, transformed his family’s struggling business into a
highly successful engineering and manufacturing operation.
Back in the 1930s his grandfather founded the Nottinghamshire
engineering firm FS Hunt & Co. The group was all but dissolved in
1975, when Langley picked up one of the last remnants: a mining
equipment manufacturer with just 10 employees. Retford-based
Langley Holdings turned in £104 m profit on £76 6m sales in 2016
and showed more than £499m net assets. Langley likes to keep a
close eye on his businesses, having bought a helicopter and a
twin-turbo jet to make it easier to get around to his plants and
offices. A passionate sailor , he owns the racing yacht Gladiator.
Langley Holdings is worth at least £1.2bn, to which we add £120m
for past dividends and other interests. 2016: £1.125bn, 101=99 £ 1.3bn £ 150 m ▲
DAVID HARDING
Hedge fundWinton Capital appeared to be one of the winners of Brexit when
Britain voted to leave the EU last June. The hedge fund set up in
1997 by Cambridge physicist Harding, 55, was said to have
gained $1.1bn in the days after the referendum. But the success
may have tasted sour; Harding had donated £1m to the
“remain” campaign. He is rapidly expanding Winton — his middle
name — as the business manages more than $30bn of clients’
assets from nine offices around the world. We take account of at
least £50m of philanthropy in recent years, including a £20m gift
to the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge. 2016: £1.15bn, 95=100 £ 1.296 bn £ 126 m ▲
CHRISTINA ONG AND FAMILY
Retailing and hotelsOng’s knack for snapping up London’s designer shops like they’re
going out of fashion once earned her the label “Queen of Bond
Street”. The Singaporean style mogul, 69, is not shy in the
boardroom either. It was handbags at dawn when she ousted
Mulberry’s founder, Roger Saul, in a coup in 2003. The daughter
of a multimillionaire, she married billionaire property magnate
Ong Beng Seng, whose Singapore-based Hotel Properties has
had London residential developments in Mayfair, Chelsea and
Holland Park. A 1.1-acre site at Paddington is the next project in
the pipeline. The couple, who have children Melissa, 41, and
Jonathan, 28, complement each other. “He’s like a hurricane,” she
said in a rare interview, “I’m like a swan.” Her hotel chain Como
— combining her initials and Melissa’s — includes the Halkin and
the Metropolitan in London, which feature white interiors and
holistic spas, plus yoga mats in each room. Beng Seng’s 77.74%
stake in Hotel Properties is worth £880m. The family’s holding in
Mulberry has risen £51m to £366m, and she also owns the Club
21 retail group she founded in 1972. 2016: £1.17bn, 93101 £ 1.285bn £ 5 m ▲
THE THOMSON FAMILY
MediaDundee shipowner William Thomson took an interest in local
newspapers in the 1870s, buying the Dundee Courier in 1886 and
passing it on to his son DC Thomson. Today the group publishes
a stable of Scottish titles as well as The Beano comic and Danger
Mouse magazine. In 2015-16 profits fell to £24.2m on £275.4m
turnover but we value the family on the £1.17bn net assets, adding
£115m for past dividends and other wealth. 2016: £1.28bn, 84=102 £ 1.28bn No change ■
SIR MICHAEL HINTZE
Hedge fundLondon-based Hintze, 63, gave £100,000 to one of the main
Brexit campaigns. Born in China to Russian parents, he served
three years in the Australian army before coming to London in
the 1980s and working for Goldman Sachs. He is the majority
owner of the CQS hedge fund, which has £9.5bn under
management. He established the Hintze Family CharitableFoundation, backing projects ranging from theatres and hospitals
to churches and schools. Hintze has spent at least £77m on
Australian property and farmland. 2016: £1.28bn, 84=103= £ 1.25bn £ 150 m ▲
JOHN CHRISTODOULOU
PropertyCyprus-born Christodoulou, 51 , fled the 1974 Turkish invasion
with his family, settling in London, where he trained as a diamond
mounter and bought his first property in 1994. Assets at his Yianis
Holdings stood at £531 m in 2015-16. He owns two five-star hotels
in Canary Wharf and 2,000 residential and commercial freehold
units in central London, along with Liverpool’s Radisson Blu and
the Hilton Tower in Manchester. 2016: £1.1bn, 103=105 £ 1.207 bn £ 127 m ▲
ZAMEER CHOUDREY AND FAMILY
Cash and carry and pharmaciesSince 2004 Choudrey has run Bestway, the London cash-and-
carry giant that in 2014 acquired the Co-operative Pharmacy
operation, rebranding it as Well Pharmacy. Bestway profits
reached a record £400 m in 2015-16 and the business, which has
substantial banking, property and cement interests, had assets
of £1.9bn. The separate Bestway Northern is worth its £170m net
assets. Choudrey, 59, a nephew of Bestway founder Sir Anwar
Pervez (qv), has a £1.176bn stake. 2016: £1.08bn, 106=CHRISTINA ONG
AND FAMILY
Entry 100, £1.296bn103= £ 1.25 bn £ 100 m ▲
LORD SUGAR
PropertyDonald Trump, his former opposite
number in the US version of The
Apprentice, has a new job at the White
House but Sugar, 70, is still doing what he
does best: making a fortune from London
property and preparing withering
put-downs for wannabe tycoons in this
year’s 13th series of his reality TV show.
Sugar’s biggest development to date is
Crosspoint: almost 50,000 sq ft of offi ce
and retail space opening this year in the
heart of the City. More projects are in the
pipeline, with the Chigwell-based tycoon
expected to make a typically good return
from buildings in Shoreditch and
Clerkenwell. He sold Burberry’s London
fl agship store to Qatari investors for £65mjust two years after paying £31.5m for it,
and made £50m on a Mayfair tower block.
The son of a Hackney tailor, Sugar
founded the Amstrad electronics
operation in his twenties, making about
£36m from its £125m sale in 2007, and
chaired Premier League club Tottenham
Hotspur from 1991 to 2001, earning £25m
for his stake. He was appointed in 2016 as
David Cameron’s enterprise tsar — a role
he also held under Gordon Brown — but
Theresa May has in the past taken
exception to his “old-fashioned views on
women in the workplace”. Last year he
won £20,000 in damages after the Daily
Mail called him a “spiv” — and donated the
money to charity. 2016: £1.15bn, 95=REX; GETTY
The Sunday Times Magazine • 45