Terry Gou, founder of iPhone assembler Foxconn, replaced by instant noodle moguls at top of Forbes Asia’s Taiwan rich list

Terry Gou, once Taiwan’s richest man and a former presidential candidate, has slipped from first to fourth place on Forbes Asia’s latest rich list of Taiwanese billionaires and their families. Gou, who ran in the Kuomintang primary to compete in the 2020 Taiwan presidential election, saw his fortune fall from US$7.3 billion to US$6.9 billion.

Gou made his fortune as founder and chairman of Foxconn, the world’s largest contract manufacturer and Taiwan’s largest employer. CNBC reported in May 2019 that Foxconn was the biggest assembler of Apple products.

Overall, Taiwan’s 50 richest people or families saw their net wealth rise 7.7 per cent to US$112 billion from US$104 billion in November 2018. That gain was relatively poor, considering that Taiwan’s benchmark stock index rose 22 per cent in the same period, Forbes said.

The richest family in Taiwan is that of the Wei brothers, who jointly own Ting Hsin International, which owns some of the most popular instant food brands such as instant noodles in China and is a shareholder in the Taipei 101 building. The Wei brothers are now worth an estimated US$7.2 billion. Ting Hsin International was at the centre of food scandals in 2013 and 2014, including the so-called Gutter Oil scandal, in which cooking oil was mixed with waste oil and animal feed.

Tsai Eng-meng of snack maker Want Want China added US$1.4 billion to his net worth, rising to No. 3 on the list with a net worth of US$7 billion.

Forbes Asia reported that 25 members of the list gained this year, and nine of them made their fortunes in the technology industry.