Families behind companies from Samsung to Reliance are riding demand for chips, metals and infrastructure, lifting their combined wealth to a record $647 billion.
Even as warnings of an AI bubble grow louder, the fortunes tied to powering the technology are swelling just as quickly, enriching Asia’s wealthiest dynasties and tightening their grip on the region’s economic landscape.
Across the continent, family-controlled empires are profiting not by building AI itself, but by supplying its backbone — metals, chips and infrastructure — underscoring how the boom is reshaping old fortunes as much as it is minting new ones.
Those bets, alongside a rebound in Hong Kong real estate, helped lift the combined wealth of Asia’s 20 richest families by 16% to $647 billion — the highest total and biggest annual increase since the Bloomberg Billionaires Index first compiled the list in 2019 — even as global equities slid into a correction with the US-Iran conflict rattling markets.
None benefited more than the Zhangs. Shares of China Hongqiao Group Ltd. returned nearly 200% last year as investors embraced aluminum. The appeal of the malleable metal lies in its durability, light weight and resistance to corrosion, qualities that make it indispensable for servers, data centers and power-intensive AI systems, as well as electric vehicles and renewable energy equipment.
These days, “governments are becoming more nationalistic,” said Marleen Dieleman, a professor at IMD Business School in Singapore. “They want data centers and production capabilities to be in the country. These families are well-positioned for that.”
The families featured either declined or did not reply to requests for comment.
