Prince Alwaleed bin Al Talal of Saudi Arabia, one of the richest men in the Middle East, visited Seoul on May 16 and called on Eun Seong-soo, president of the Korea Investment Corp. and Chairman Park Hyun-joo of Mirae Asset Group to discuss cooperation on investments. His visit to Korea was his first since his 1998 visit to Seoul when he invested $100 million in Hyundai Motor.
The Saudi prince reportedly discussed a project to build a new town in Saudi Arabia while in Seoul.
Prince Alwaleed is a cousin of King Salman bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, with assets totaling $32 billion, making him the world’s 4th richest man, according to the Forbes report in 2015. He is chairman of Kingdom Holdings Corp. (KHC).
KHC holds stakes in such global companies as GM, Disney, 21st Century Fox and Apple, among others. He is also the majority shareholder of the Four Seasons, one of the largest hotel chains in the world.
Four Seasons opened a hotel in Gwanghwamun, Seoul, recently, which led to his meeting with Chairman Park of Mirae Asset, which has a large stake in the new Four Seasons Hotel.
At the meeting, both Prince Alwaleed and President Eun agreed to cooperate on making joint investments in large projects in third countries and expand cooperation between KIC and KHC as former is forbidden to invest in domestic projects by law in Korea.
They also agreed to talk further on investments in the Jeddah Project jointly promoted by Saudi Arabia and Libya, a project to develop the city of Jeddah by constructing the 200-floor Kingdom Tower , the tallest in the world, so the Saudi city will be three times larger than Dubai.
Prince Alwaleed was born in 1955. He is the grandson of two important historical figures, King Abdulaziz Alsaud, founder and first ruler of Saudi Arabia, and Riad El Solh, an iconic statesman in Lebanon’s drive for independence and its first Prime Minister.
He received his Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, magna cum laude, from Menlo College in California in l979, and his Masters in Social Sciences with Honors from Syracuse University in New York in 1985.
In recognition of his business and civic accomplishments, Prince Alwaleed has been the recipient of numerous honors and accolades from many organizations, societies, monarchs and heads of state. These include 23 Honorary Doctorates from universities in the U.S., Britain, Korea, Egypt, Malaysia, Ghana, Palestine, Philippines, Tunisia and Uganda, Indonesia, Bulgaria and Madagascar.
Founded in 1980, KHC is a publicly traded company which was listed on Tadawul (the Saudi Stock Exchange) in 2007. KHC is one of the world’s most successful and diversified business organizations, highly respected in the field of investments and recognized as an elite player in the Arabian Gulf region, and internationally.
The Company is recognized as one of the largest foreign investors in the United States. KHC’s portfolio has its major interests in investment categories ranging from luxury hotels management, hotel companies (Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, Fairmont Raffles Holding Intl and Movenpick Hotels, Resorts AG and Swissotel) and real estate investment sector (Kingdom Tower project in Jeddah and Kingdom Tower and project in Riyadh and Kingdom City) to hotel real estate investments such as (The Plaza, New York, Savoy Hotel, London and Four Seasons, George V Hotel, Paris and other hotels).
KHC also has investments in Petrochemicals (Tasnee) Media (News Corporation and 21st Century Fox), as well as in Entertainment (Euro Disney S.C.A). In addition, Banking and Investment sector (Citigroup), Technology (Twitter and JD.com) and Transportation (Lyft).
Landmark hotel properties include the George V in Paris, the newly renovated Fairmont Plaza in New York City and The Savoy in London, in addition to the Fairmont in San Francisco and Four Seasons in Toronto.
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