Tony Tiah’s son becomes TA Global CEO

TA Enterprise Bhd managing director and chief executive officer Datin Alicia Tiah (left) and deputy chief executive officer Tiah Joo Kim (Date: Nov 18,08, Venue: Menara TA, KL)

KUALA LUMPUR: TA Global Bhd has appointed Tiah Joo Kim, son of executive chairman and substantial shareholder Datuk Tony Tiah Thee Kian, to the newly-created post of chief executive officer effective Jan 1, 2016.

The property developer and hotel operator, which is 60.17% owned by TA Enterprise Bhd, told Bursa Malaysia that Joo Kim, 36, had led the group’s foreign expansion into Canada and most notably, recently spearheaded its flagship development there, the Trump International Hotel & Tower Vancouver.

TA Global’s foreign property projects are located in Canada and Australia and it has hotel properties in Singapore, Thailand, Australia, China, and Canada.

TA Global has never had a CEO post since it made its listing debut in November 2009.

Joo Kim has a masters of international business degree from Macquarie University, Sydney. He completed his bachelor’s degree in management at Oral Roberts University in Oklahoma.

TA Global, which also announced its quarterly results on Thursday, reported a net loss of RM46.93mil for the third quarter ended Oct 31, 2015, compared with a net profit of RM44.78mil in the corresponding period of last year. Revenue fell by a third (33.5%) to RM135.22mil.

Its property development business swung to a pre-tax loss of RM7.4mil versus profit of RM12mil previously, while hotel operations’ net operating profit shrank 38.6% to RM11.3mil.

On the property segment, TA Global said the loss for the quarter and current period to-date were mainly due to the absence of revenue generating projects and higher finance costs.

As for the hospitality business, it noted that there was lower occupancy of Swissotel Merchant Court, Singapore which is currently undergoing major refurbishment works.

The biggest drop, however, was in the finance and related services, whose pre-tax profit plunged from RM75.2mil to RM2.2mil. “The huge drop in the current quarter was mainly due to loan recovery income accounted for in the previous year’s corresponding quarter,” the company said.

On its prospects for the year, TA Global said although the recovery in the US economy was gaining momentum, the global economy was expected to remain subdued in view of the lower oil prices and China’ slowdown in growth. 

Meanwhile, it added, the domestic economy was expected to be more challenging due to slower export growth and anticipated moderate private consumption following the implementation of goods and services tax (GST) in April.

On the property business’ prospects, the company said due to the challenging economic outlook, stringent mortgage approvals, cooling measures introduced by the Government and the wait-and-see approach adopted by property investors on the implementation of GST, it forecast lower property sales in Malaysia.

As the Australian property market is experiencing strong residential sales, the group will continue to focus on its Little Bay Cove project and hope to roll out new launches from this project for the financial year.

“We are confident that our sales from these new launches in Australia will be resilient,” it said. 

TA Global shares and TA Enterprise shares both closed unchanged on Thursday at 27 sen and 59.5 sen respectively.



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