Thein Tun (businessman)

Thein Tun (Burmese: သိန်းထွန်း; 26 March 1937[1] – 18 April 2022)[1] was a Burmese businessman and founder of Myanmar Golden Star.[2] He was best known for introducing Pepsi into the Burmese market through Myanmar Golden Star in 1991.[2] He benefited from close connections with Tun Kyi, a former Burmese general.[2]

For the politician, see Thein Tun.
Thein Tun
Born(1937-03-26)26 March 1937
Wakema Township, Irrawaddy Division, British Burma
Died18 April 2022(2022-04-18) (aged 85)
Bangkok, Thailand
Known forFounder of Myanmar Golden Star
Children3

Early life

Thein Tun was born in Wakema Township, Irrawaddy Division (now Ayeyarwady Region).[3]

Career

In 1990, Thein Tun introduced Pepsi to the Burmese market, after PepsiCo entered into a 10-year joint venture with Thein Tun's Myanmar Golden Star (MGS).[3] In 1997, amid new US sanctions on the Burmese military junta, PepsiCo exited the Burmese market.[3] In 2014, he sold 70% of MGS' shares to Korean-owned Lotte Chilsung.[3]

Thein Tun also founded Tun Foundation Bank. In 2014, he acquired majority stake in Myanmar Consolidated Media, which owns Myanmar Times.[4] The newspaper suspended operations in February 2021, following the 2021 Myanmar coup d'état, after employees resigned en masse.[3]

Death

He died in Bangkok, Thailand on 18 April 2022.[3]

Personal life

Thein Tun was married to Nelly Than.[2] He had 2 sons and one daughter. His son, Thant Zin Tun, is president of Mandalay Novotel Hotel and LP Holding Group, while another son, Oo Tun, is managing director of MGS Beverages.[2] His only daughter, Mi Mi Tun, is an executive director at MGS Beverages.[2] Thein Tun's son-in-law, Aung Moe Kyaw, owns International Beverages Trading.[5]

References
  1. "မြန်မာနိုင်ငံစီးပွားရေးကဏ္ဍ ဖွံ့ဖြိုးရေးနှင့် လူမှုအကျိုးဆောင်ပုဂ္ဂိုလ်ကြီး ဦးသိန်းထွန်း | Ministry Of Information". www.moi.gov.mm. Retrieved 22 April 2022.
  2. "Burmese Tycoons Part II". The Irrawaddy. July 2000. Retrieved 11 July 2015.
  3. Oo, Dominic (2022-05-18). "'Godfather' of Myanmar's crony capitalists dies". Asia Times. Retrieved 2023-09-26.
  4. "Tycoon U Thein Tun buys majority share The Myanmar Times". Mizzima. 3 March 2014. Retrieved 11 July 2015.
  5. Aung Min; Toshihiro Kudo (2014). "Business Conglomerates in the Context of Myanmar's Economic Reform" (PDF). Myanmar's Integration with Global Economy: Outlook and Opportunities. Bangkok Research Report. Archived from the original (PDF) on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 11 July 2015.
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