Chairman of Hoa Phat: I don't know how much money I have

Share withVnExpressAfter being recognized by Forbes as a USD billionaire with 1.3 billion USD in assets,Mr. Tran Dinh Long - Chairman of the Board of Directors of Hoa Phat Group,confess that for a long time I have not worked towards the goal of earning a specific amount of money per day.

- What did you and your family talk about when you found out your name was on the 2018 USD billionaire list just announced by Forbes?

- No one in my family mentioned this title because even I myself found it very normal. As for the company, with or without that title, at Hoa Phat everything still operates the same.

The greater joy for me is that in the information announced by this organization, there is Mr. Tran Ba ​​Duong - Chairman of Truong Hai Auto Corporation and I, representing 2 industrial manufacturing enterprises. For countries with new industries like Vietnam, sooner or later there will be USD billionaires in this field. However, I think that behind the ranking, it is the recognition of the development of the Vietnamese economy, Vietnamese manufacturing enterprises are beginning to have a foothold in the world market.

- What do you think about your $1.3 billion fortune that Forbes just announced?

- Actually, every day when I work, I don't think about money so I don't even know how much money I have. I'm not the only one, but many people are like that. When you work to a certain level, you don't have to find out the specific daily amount of money anymore. That's for sure, I'm not being modest or avoiding anything.

- There are many conflicting views about rich people today. What do you personally think about this?

- My point of view is that there are many perspectives and aspects to any problem. No problem can be viewed from only one direction.

The same goes for the rich. Whether I like it or not, many people still call me a tycoon, it is unavoidable. However, I hope that over time and with the world of increasingly transparent information, the negative views of the rich will decrease.

From the perspective of a businessman or anyone else, I think the most important thing is to do your job well every day. When we do well, sooner or later our perspective will change in a positive direction. Because the better we do, the more our contribution to the state and society will increase, such as tax obligations, social responsibility, job creation, etc.

- Many people think that being an entrepreneur is very busy, stressful and even requires many trade-offs and prices. What about you?

- I think the problem is still due to each person's way of thinking and what kind of life that businessman wants. I don't want to live a life of being busy all day, having two phones on both ears or not having enough time to have breakfast, lunch or dinner with my family. For example, from morning until now, I have only had one phone call, but it was a wrong call, not because someone called to discuss work.

I still have time to fully enjoy my hobbies such as drinking coffee, playing sports… The place where we drink coffee and chat with friends is not a luxurious place, but it has been the same place for 20 years.

Some people are so busy that they don’t have time to travel, but like me, I have to travel at least 4 times a year and always with my family. When I come home at night, I don’t receive guests except in very special cases. And I am also very proud to be the person who eats 30 home-cooked meals a month, even 365 days a year.

* Billionaire Tran Dinh Long talks about time for family, friends and travel

- Multi-industry business is the trend of many enterprises, especially real estate is always attractive but it seems you are still quite loyal to "steel". What is the fate of you and Hoa Phat with real estate?

- Maybe it's because I'm passionate about the manufacturing sector and I'm determined to follow this path. I want to emphasize that I have to be very determined because in many stages, in terms of profit, making steel is not as profitable as investing in real estate.

For example, in the years 1996-2000, many units rushed into real estate and even some people bought last week, the next week sold for double the profit. In those years, several shareholders in the company also discussed spending about 9 billion VND to buy an office. However, I also gave my opinion, if we bought that real estate, there would be no more money to build a steel factory, it was up to everyone to choose and in the end we chose steel. KAt that time, Hoa Phat was a rather strange business because rich people all invested in real estate.

I suppose if at that time Hoa Phat chose not to make steel but to make real estate, the path might have been different now, although it is impossible to know whether the scale would have been larger or smaller than it is now.However, in the long run, Hoa Phat has never wanted to invest all its potential in the real estate sector, while steel still accounts for the largest proportion.

-What is Hoa Phat's vision for the next 10 years, sir?

-At each point in time we always determine where to focus.In the short term, with existing potentialHoa Phat is focusing on the Hoa Phat Dung Quat Iron and Steel Complex project because this is a huge investment, expected to be the group's steel punch. We have the ambition to be in the Top 50 largest steel producing companies in the world after 2020.

In the longer term, from now until 2025, Hoa Phat's goal is still to focus on the steel industry and steel-related products. We would like to reveal that we are conducting research on the production of stainless steel - an item that Vietnam still imports 100%.

I emphasize that Hoa Phat has not abandoned other areas, it has just not focused on them yet and there is nothing to regret because once we do this, we will stop doing other things. But if we set the goal of equal progress in all areas, it will be very difficult.