Ramon Ang lands on Bloomberg 50 list
Credit to Author: The Manila Times| Date: Sat, 21 Dec 2019 16:17:11 +0000
RAMON S. ANG, president and chief operating officer of San Miguel Corp. (SMC), has made it to the annual Bloomberg 50, an elite list of top innovators, entrepreneurs and leaders who have changed the global business landscape, as compiled by Bloomberg Businessweek. He is the first Filipino to make it to the unranked list.
The Bloomberg 50 represents the most influential thought leaders in business, entertainment, politics, finance, fashion, and science and technology, whose accomplishments were particularly noteworthy and defined 2019.
“It’s a great honor, and I’m grateful to Bloomberg for taking note of our work and the developments here in the Philippines,” Ang said. “I hope this helps to showcase the many great and positive things happening in our country.”
Joining Ang in the list are Warner Media News and Sports Chairman and CNN President Jeff Zucker, television host Jon Stewart, pop star Rihanna, Shopify Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Tobias Lutke, Glaxosmithkline CEO Emma Walmsley, Marvel Studios President Kevin Fiege, American gymnast Simone Biles, Walmart CEO Doug McMillon, Disney International Chairman Kevin Mayer, celebrity and Kylie Cosmetics CEO Kylie Jenner, and climate activist Greta Thunberg, among others.
In the last decade, Ang engineered the massive diversification and transformation of the more than-hundred-year-old San Miguel from a beer, food, spirits and packaging company with market-leading positions to a diversified conglomerate with interests in industries crucial to Philippine economic growth: food and beverage, oil and fuels, power, infrastructure, and banking.
SMC is one of the Philippines’ largest companies in terms of revenues and profits. In 2018, its revenues breached P1 trillion, equivalent to about 5.9 percent of the country’s gross domestic product.
Reinvesting in the Philippines
Much of San Miguel’s earnings are reinvested in the Philippines in the form of growth-generating manufacturing facilities and infrastructure projects aimed at improving people’s lives, decongesting cities and sustaining economic growth.
Currently, SMC’s food and beverage business is implementing the largest capacity expansion program in its 129-year history. It is building additional breweries, new feed mills, flour mills, food processing plants, poultry facilities, and a ready-to-eat plant across the country.
These new facilities bring direct and indirect jobs and livelihood opportunities, as well as boost local economies.
SMC, under Ang, is also managing, operating and constructing some of the country’s biggest infrastructure projects.
Its expressways include the South Luzon Expressway (SLEX), Skyway 1 and 2, Southern Tagalog Arterial Road, the NAIA (Ninoy Aquino International Airport) Expressway, and the Tarlac-Pangasinan-La Union Expressway.
It is building Skyway Stage 3, which will connect SLEX and Skyway 1 and 2 to the North Luzon Expressway (NLEX) from Gil Puyat Avenue in Makati City; Skyway Stage 4, from Skyway FTI in Parañaque City to the Batasan Complex in Quezon City and San Jose del Monte City, Bulacan province; and the Skyway Extension from Alabang to SLEX Susana Heights.
SMC is also set to build the SLEX TR4 project, which will extend SLEX from Santo Tomas City, Batangas province to Lucena City in Quezon province.
The conglomerate is also building the Metro Rail Transit 7 project, which will stretch from North EDSA through Quezon City to San Jose del Monte. The project includes an intermodal transport terminal and a road component that will connect to the NLEX.
Most ambitious project
SMC’s biggest and most ambitious upcoming project to date is the New Manila International Airport project in Bulacan’s Bulakan town, just north of Metro Manila, and accessible via an expansive infrastructure network.
Worth $15 billion, the project is the company’s single largest investment to date, and the largest in the country. Once constructed, the new air hub will be the Philippines’ largest and most modern.
To be built on 2,500 hectares of land, the airport will have four runways that can be upgraded to six, and world-class facilities seen to boost the country’s competitiveness as an investment and tourism destination.
Philantropy, sustainability
Ang is also a known philanthropist. Through the San Miguel Foundation, he has channeled billions of pesos toward building housing communities for thousands of families affected by natural calamities and armed conflict.
The foundation has also built community hospitals, schools and libraries, among others. Its thrust today is to address hunger and education. It recently completed its first learning and feeding center and food bank in the poorest district of Tondo, Manila, where Ang grew up.
Under Ang, SMC has also pushed for greater sustainability, initiating a landmark water sustainability project that calls for a 50-percent reduction in the utility and domestic use of water across all its businesses by 2025.
In 2017, he announced the discontinuation of San Miguel’s plastic bottled water business as part of efforts to reduce the company’s solid waste footprint.
This year, he announced several major sustainability initiatives: a P1-billion donation to clean up the Tullahan River; building the country’s first recycled plastics road, and adopting the Philippines’ first fully-certified biodegradable plastics for various packaging requirements.
From an early age, Ang possessed an entrepreneurial spirit. He started in business importing and reconditioning heavy equipment for the local construction industry. He is a mechanical engineering graduate and an avid car aficionado and collector.
The Bloomberg 50 2019 list is published in a special issue of Bloomberg Businessweek released on December 6.