Tan Sri Ananda Krisnan

According to Wikepedia, the free Internet encyclopaedia, Tatparanandam Ananda Krishnan was born in 1938 in Brickfields, Kuala Lumpur to a Tamil immigrant family from Sri Lanka

Nicknamed TAK, Krishnan is a Malaysian businessman and philanthropist and he is estimated to worth about US$7.4 billion, making him the second wealthiest man in Southeast Asia (and world's 99th).

Krishnan hates public exposure and is known to maintain a very low profile for a person of his stature. However, his hugely successful business activities always thrust him into the limelight and his name represents a huge business empire.

Currently, he has business interests in entertainment (Astro), space (3 Satellites), oil, power, shipping, telecommunications (Maxis - Malaysia, Aircell - India), property and gaming (Pan Pools Malaysia). His companies operate in most parts of South East Asia. A quarter of his wealth comes from the gambling business (lottery, horse-racing wagering). He is also said to be behind the world's largest indoor Water Park in Tropical Islands, Germany with former Genting Group executive Colin Au. He is also pondering an online lottery venture in Russia, Wikepedia said.

Said to have an extraordinary entrepreneurial flair and being far-sighted, it was Krishnan who sold former Malaysian Prime Minister Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad the idea of the 88-storey Petronas Twin Towers, the world's second tallest building, which stake he has now sold off. “Ananda Krishnan has been called everything from a recluse to a humble, silent worker. Not much is known about him and his tightly guarded private life because he maintains such a low profile,” Wikepedia said. He is known to be apolitical but also a close friend of both Dr. Mahathir and Mahathir's former arch-foe Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah. He brokered the peace deal and healed the political rift between them a few years ago.

Despite his wealth he still maintains and stays in his family's Minangkabau styled mansion in Kuala Lumpur. He was one of the first tycoons to own a Dassault Falcon private jet.