Woon Wing Yip
| Woon Wing Yip | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Traditional Chinese | 葉煥榮 | ||||||||||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 叶焕荣 | ||||||||||||||
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Woon Wing Yip OBE (born December 1937) is a Chinese-born British entrepreneur, best known for having started the Wing Yip supermarket chain.
Early life[]
A Hakka born in December 1937 in Hong Kong,[1] in Dongguan, Guangdong Province, China. Yip arrived in Hull, England from Hong Kong in 1959 with £2. His father, uncle and brother were sundry dealers in soft drinks in Jamaica but Yip chose to go to Liverpool with a friend.[2] After working as restaurant waiter in Hull and Ipswich, Yip started his own restaurant, Diamond Chinese Restaurant in the East Anglia region of England in 1960.[3]
Wing-Yip[]
Yip had the ability to speak English and he knew that food wholesale business is more profitable than running a Chinese takeaway. Therefore, in 1969, he founded the Wing Yip supermarket in Birmingham. The Wing Yip business has since branched out into property development, management and investment, with more than 60 commercial and residential tenants around the country. The property portfolio is now worth around £23 million. With an annual turnover of £80 million, he became the first Anglo-Chinese tycoon in United Kingdom.
Other achievements[]
Yip is also a philanthropist who has among other acts of generosity, endowed several bursaries and scholarships for university students from both the UK and China, administered through the W Wing Yip and Brothers Charitable Trust. In 2008 Yip was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Birmingham City University. He was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2010 New Year Honours.[4]
Footnotes[]
- ^ "Woon Wing YIP". Companies House. Retrieved 27 January 2017.
- ^ Cheung, Gordon C. K.; Gomez, Edmund Terence (2012). "Hong Kong's Diaspora, Networks, and Family Business in the United Kingdom: A History of the Chinese "Food Chain" and the Case of W. Wing Yip Group". China Review. 12 (1): 49. ISSN 1680-2012.
- ^ "48= (46) Woon Wing Yip £80million (£80m) - Rich List 2011 - Rich List - Business - Birmingham Post". birminghampost.net. 2011. Retrieved 3 June 2011.
- ^ "No. 59282". The London Gazette (Supplement). 31 December 2009. p. 12.
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- 1937 births
- Living people
- British people of Chinese descent
- Hong Kong people of Hakka descent
- People from Dongguan
- British businesspeople
- Officers of the Order of the British Empire
- Chinese emigrants to England
- Naturalised citizens of the United Kingdom
- British business biography, 20th-century birth stubs