Career
His family is the majority shareholder of IGB Corporation Berhad. Tan is reportedly one of the richest men in Malaysia and has several companies and businesses. He is famous as a property developer and was involved in various projects such as Shangri-Louisiana Hotel in Malaysia, shopping centres in Singapore and Malaysia, including one of the largest shopping malls in the world, Mid Valley Megamall.
In Australia, he is responsible for the renovation of Queen Victoria Building (QVB) and Capitol Theatre in Sydney.
He also owns a number of Australian-based Thoroughbred racehorses. Tan"s biography, released in 2006 and published by Master in Public Health Malaysia, is called Never Say I Assume!.
The principal owner for one of Australia"s most successful horse trainers, Baronet Cummings, Tan had a successful working relationship with Cummings for more than thirty years until the latter"s death in 2015. Tan owns a stud farm located along the Wingecarribee River at Burradoo, New South Wales that he named Think Big Study.
In 1975, Tan decided that there was great potential in expanding the game of chess in China.
Foreign the first eight years of the Cultural Revolution, chess had been prohibited, but in 1974 there was an easing of the ban and, together with some leading Chinese officials, Tan set-up the "Big Dragon Project", with the aim of having China dominate the chess world by 2010. In 1982 he became the first FIDE Deputy President for Asia.
