Malaysian billionaire Ananda Krishnan dies at 86

KUALA LUMPUR - Mr Ananda Krishnan, the elusive billionaire who rose from oil trader to one of Malaysia's most prolific dealmakers and bankrolled the 1985 Live Aid concert, has died. He was 86.

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Mr Ananda's investment holding company announced his death in a statement, saying he made "significant contributions to nation building and the corporate world" and his philanthropy had "touched many lives".

He died peacefully on Nov 28, it said.

In a decades-long career that ran parallel to Malaysia's economic rise, Mr Ananda built a reputation as a savvy, Harvard-trained businessman whose fingerprints were everywhere, but who would rarely show up in person.

After a successful run in petroleum, he made forays into entertainment, power, gambling and more, amassing a fortune estimated at US$3.8 billion (S$5.1 billion) as at August 2024, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Underpinning his success was a long friendship with Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Malaysia's prime minister from 1981 to 2003, and from 2018 to 2020.

The two men bonded in London in the 1970s.

While Dr Mahathir was in power, Mr Ananda won numerous licences for telecommunications, satellite and broadcasting operations.

And he got the nod to turn a racetrack area in downtown Kuala Lumpur into a massive city within a city, crowned by the Petronas Towers - the world's tallest twin buildings.