 Taikoo Sugar | |
| Formation | June 1881 |
|---|---|
| Founder | John Samuel Swire |
| Legal status | Company |
| Headquarters | Hong Kong |
| Products | Sugar |
Taikoo Sugar Refinery is a sugar importer and former sugar refinery in Hong Kong.
| Taikoo Sugar | |
| Formation | June 1881 |
|---|---|
| Founder | John Samuel Swire |
| Legal status | Company |
| Headquarters | Hong Kong |
| Products | Sugar |
Taikoo Sugar Refinery is a sugar importer and former sugar refinery in Hong Kong.
Taikoo Sugar Refinery [1] was established by John Samuel Swire in June 1881 after a thorough investigation into the feasibility and openings for a new refinery in China. [2] His determination to build the largest and most up-to-date plant was initially stimulated by a period of intense rivalry with Jardine, Matheson & Co. who already owned a refinery. A site for the refinery was selected at Quarry Bay, Hong Kong and the capital for the venture was put up chiefly by John Samuel Swire himself, Holt's James Barrow, H J Butterfield, Messrs. Ismay and Imrie, W J Thompson and R N Dale. [3]
Taikoo Sugar Refinery at Quarry Bay began operations in 1884. [4]
John Swire & Sons were appointed Managers and Butterfield and Swire, Hong Kong, were responsible for the overall management and, as General Agents, for the purchase of raw sugars and the selling and distribution of the finished products. China was always the chief market but Australia, Japan and India were also important at different times.[ citation needed ]
The Taikoo Sugar Refinery (TSR) faced stiff competition from Jardine Matheson & Co. in its early years but, by the 1920s, the Japanese had become their greatest competitors. An up-country marketing system was established to counter this and to expand TSR markets in inland China, as well as efforts to widen the Far Eastern areas served by TSR.[ citation needed ]
The 1920s was a period of constant difficulties - a strike in 1923, poor markets in 1924 and a three-month boycott in 1925. 1925, however, also saw the expansion of the Taikoo Sugar Refinery into the largest single unit refinery in the world. In December 1941 Hong Kong fell to the Japanese and production was halted until the plant was returned to John Swire & Sons in the autumn of 1945.[ citation needed ]
Taikoo's sugar refining activity appears to have ceased around 1970 and the company is now a major sugar importer. [5] The site of the refinery has redeveloped into Taikoo Place, a commercial building complex.
Swire Group is a highly diversified global corporation, with businesses encompassing property, beverages and food chain, aviation, marine, as well as trading and industrial activities. Its core businesses are mainly focused on Asia, with its key operations in Hong Kong and the Chinese Mainland. Within Asia, Swire's activities come under the group's publicly quoted arm, Swire Pacific Limited, which is the largest shareholder in two Hong Kong listed companies: Swire Properties and Cathay Pacific. The Group's parent company, John Swire & Sons Limited, holds controlling stakes in a range of businesses trading in the UK, USA, Australia, Papua New Guinea, East and West Africa, and across Southeast Asia. Taikoo (太古) is the Chinese name of Swire. It serves as the brand name for businesses such as Taikoo Sugar and Taikoo Shing.
DFI Retail Group Holdings Limited is a Hong Kong-based retail company with legal bases in Bermuda and Singapore. A subsidiary of the Jardine Matheson Group, it is a major East and Southeast Asian retailer involved in the processing and wholesaling of food and health and beauty products. Jardine Strategic, a publicly listed holding company, has an attributable 78 percent stake in the firm. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange, with secondary listings on the Singapore Exchange (SGX) and Bermuda Stock Exchange (BSX).
Noble House is a novel by James Clavell, published in 1981 and set in Hong Kong in 1963. It is the fourth book published in Clavell's Asian Saga and is chronologically the fifth book in the series. The "Noble House" in the title is the nickname of Struan's, the trading company first introduced in Clavell's Tai-Pan.
East Point was a spit on the northern shore of Hong Kong Island, Hong Kong. It extended from East Point Hill, i.e. Lee Garden towards Kellett Island and marked the eastern limits of the early City of Victoria. The piece of land separated Causeway Bay in the east and Wong Nai Chung in the west. Streams and muds from Tai Hang and Wong Nai Chung shaped the spit.
Quarry Bay is an area beneath Mount Parker in the Eastern District of Hong Kong Island, in Hong Kong. Quarry Bay is bordered by Sai Wan Ho to the east, Mount Parker to the south, North Point to the west, and Victoria Harbour to the north.
Tai Koo may refer to:
The China Navigation Company Limited (CNCo) is a London-based holding company of merchant shipping companies Swire Shipping Pte Ltd and Swire Bulk Pte Ltd, both of which are headquartered in Singapore.
Taikoo Shing or Tai Koo Shing, is a private residential development in Quarry Bay, in the eastern part of Hong Kong Island, Hong Kong. It is a part of Swire's property business, along with Taikoo Place, the adjacent Cityplaza retail and office complex and EAST, a lifestyle business hotel.
Taikoo Place is a commercial building complex located in Quarry Bay, east Hong Kong Island, Hong Kong. It comprises grade A office towers, car parking, clubs, office apartment, parks, and shops. It is reachable by MTR Island line (MTR). These three complexes are all managed by Swire Properties since the beginning from Taikoo Sugar Refinery, the subsequent Taikoo Dockyard and the recent demolitions of the industrial buildings.
A taipan, sometimes spelled tai-pan, is a foreign-born senior business executive or entrepreneur operating in mainland China or Hong Kong.
Taikoo Dockyard and Engineering Company was a dockyard in what is now Taikoo Shing, MTR Tai Koo station and part of Taikoo Place of Quarry Bay on the Hong Kong Island in Hong Kong. It predates the era before the reclamation of Victoria Harbour.
Swire is an English surname, and may refer to:
A hong was a type of Chinese merchant establishment and its associated type of building. Hongs arose in Guangzhou as intermediaries between Western and Chinese merchants during the 18–19th century, under the Canton System.
Russell & Company was the largest American trading house of the mid-19th century in China. The firm specialised in trading tea, silk and opium and was eventually involved in the shipping trade.
Dodwell & Co. or Dodwell's, was one of the leading British merchant firms, or hongs, active in China and Japan during the 19th and 20th century. It was a direct rival to Jardine, Matheson & Co.
Swire Properties Limited is a property developer, owner and operator of mixed-use, principally commercial properties in Hong Kong and Mainland China. Founded and headquartered in Hong Kong in 1972, Swire Properties is a major property developer in Hong Kong, and is listed on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong. Including subsidiaries, it employs around 4,500 people. The company is, in turn, a subsidiary of the publicly-listed Swire Pacific Limited.
The Mount Parker Cable Car was a Aerial tramway system in Hong Kong, connecting Quarry Gap and Quarry Bay near the present location of Yau Man Street.
Charles Collingwood Roberts was a British entrepreneur. He was a former Chairman of the Butterfield & Swire and an unofficial member of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong.
John Samuel Swire (1825-1898) was a British businessman. He grew his family business, the Swire Group, and expanded the cotton and sugar trade with China. He established the Taikoo Sugar Refinery in Hong Kong and The China Navigation Company on the Yangtze river. He was the instigator and founding chairman of the China and Japan Conference. This shipping cartel existed from 1879 to 2008 and was a major component of the shipping industry from the Far East to Europe.
William Charles Goddard Knowles, CBE, MA, LLD, JP was a British businessman in Hong Kong. He was general manager of the Butterfield and Swire, chairman of the Cathay Pacific Airways, member of the Legislative Council and the Executive Council and vice-chancellor of the University of Hong Kong.
