Hashim
Djojohadikusumo
He is one of
a new generation of Indonesian businessmen with increasingly international
agendas.
Hashim’s
recent announcement that he is buying 40% of Bank Niaga, Indonesia’s sixth
largest private bank. He intends to buy another 10% on the open market. The 43
years old owner of Tirtamas Group hopes the $232 million deal will lay a
foundation for a growing financial services business because it can make him
solid enough to withstand foreign competition in years ahead. Indonesia is a
part of the ASEAN Free Trade Area, which calls for the nation’s financial
services market to be opened to foreign competition in 2003.
According to
Hashim, one of the country’s most successful entrepreneurs, Indonesian banks
need to be stronger and more professional. Being stronger and more professional,
they can give strong financial support to the businessmen, for some examples,
for Hashim’s group, Tirtamas already owns the smallish Bank Pelita; a 19,8%
stake in Bank Papan Sejahtera, a consumer lender; a 5% share of Bank Universal,
controlled by manufacturing giant Astra International; and 20% in brokerage
Merril Lynch Indonesia. By having such strong financial supports, and from Bank
Niaga as well, Tirtamas will add an insurance presence and as well as build its
brokerage activities through the bank’s BZW Niaga Securities. Hashim,
therefore, has interest in coal mining, power generation, real estate and
petrochemical plants.
He has never
been bounded by boarders, so his trading company, Primacomexindo, has made him
an international level businessman.
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