Former tobacco executive Gnanalingam established Westports Holdings, a multi-cargo port operator that he co-founded with Ahmayuddin Ahmad on securing the concession in 1994.
Westports owns a 60-year concession to operate and expand its container terminals in Pulau Indah and Port Klang, which will end in 2054.
It is one of three main ports in the Straits of Malacca that handles gateway transhipment container cargo.
According to Forbes’ 50 Richest list, the tycoon was the 13th richest Malaysian with a net worth of US$1.4 billion (RM6.52 billion) in 2023.
His son, Ruben Emir Gnanalingam Abdullah, is group managing director while daughter Shaline Gnanalingam is a non-independent, non-executive director of the company.
Under his astute leadership, Westports became one of the largest companies on Bursa Malaysia, with a market capitalisation of RM12.04 billion.
The group has a container handling capacity of over 13.7 million twenty-foot equivalent units annually.
Westports and Gnanalingam received the stamp of approval from Hong Kong’s then richest man Li Ka-shing’s Hutchison Whampoa which took a 30% stake in Westports, ahead of its initial public offering in 2013.
CK Hutchison Holdings Ltd still owns a 23.55% stake in Westports via South Port Investment Holdings Ltd.
Born in 1945, Gnanalingam was married to Siew Yong Gnanalingam, who was the former spokesperson and group communications vice- president at Malaysian Airline System (MAS). They have three children.
After obtaining his bachelor of arts degree from University of Malaya in 1968, he started his career with the British American Tobacco group the same year as a sales representative, and was later promoted as marketing director in 1980.
He was also an alumni of Harvard Business School in the US, having attended its advanced management programme in 1983.
In 1988, Gnanalingam started a marketing consultancy named G-Team Consultants Sdn Bhd, which acted as the corporate consultant for the marketing operations of Radio Television Malaysia from 1988 to 2000.
At the close of trading today, Westports’ share price was unchanged at RM3.53, giving it a market capitalisation of RM12.04 billion.
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