Latifur Rahman (businessman)

Latifur Rahman (28 August 1945 – 1 July 2020)[1] was a Bangladeshi business magnate and media mogul. He served as the founding chairman and CEO of Transcom Group[2] which deals with beverages, electrical and electronics products, pharmaceuticals, fast food, snacks and breakfast cereals, print media, FM radio and tea plantations mostly as the comprador of international brands like Pizza Hut, KFC, Pepsi and Philips.[3] He was the founding director of Mediaworld and chairman of Mediastar, which owned The Daily Star and Prothom Alo newspapers respectively.[4] Both are the leading English and Bangla newspapers of the country.[4]

Latifur Rahman
লতিফুর রহমান
Rahman in 2017
Born(1945-08-28)28 August 1945
Jalpaiguri, Bengal Presidency, British India
Died1 July 2020(2020-07-01) (aged 74)
Cumilla, Bangladesh
NationalityBangladeshi
OccupationIndustrialist, chairman of Transcom Group
Spouse(s)Shahnaz Rahman
AwardsOslo Business for Peace Award (2012)

Rahman received the Oslo Business for Peace Award 2012 in 2012 for his recognition of business ethics and social responsibility.[5]

Career

Rahman started his career as a trainee in 1966 in his family-owned jute mills in Chandpur District. He worked as an executive in the mills until 1971.[6] Rahman established Transcom Group in 1973[7] after W Rahman Jute Mills, the main earning source for the Rahman family, was nationalised in 1972.[8] In the 1980s, Rahman became the sole importer and distributor of Nestlé products in Bangladesh. In the 1990s, he bought Smith, Kline & French, a US-based pharmaceutical which had merged into Beecham Group, a British company, and renamed it Eskayef.[9]

Rahman was elected a member of the executive board of the Paris-based International Chamber of Commerce for a three-year term in July 2014.[10] He served as the president of Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MCCI), Dhaka.[11]

Rahman served as the Chairman of the following companies.[2]

  • Bangladesh Lamps Ltd
  • Transcom Ltd
  • Transcom Beverages Ltd
  • Transcom Electronics Ltd
  • Eskayef Bangladesh Ltd
  • Transcom Foods Ltd
  • Transcom Distribution Co Ltd
  • Mediastar Ltd
  • Transcraft Ltd
  • Ayna Broadcasting Corp Ltd
  • Tea Holdings Ltd
  • Transcom Mobile Ltd
  • Transcom Cables Ltd
  • Nestle Bangladesh Ltd
  • Mediaworld Ltd
  • Holcim Cement Bangladesh Ltd

Awards

Personal life

Rahman was married to Shahnaz Rahman. Together they had three daughters, Simeen Hossain, Shazneen Rahman, and Shahzreh Huq, and a son, Arshad Waliur Rahman.[16] Simeen is a managing director of Eskayef Bangladesh Limited, Transcom Consumer Products Limited and Transcom Distribution Limited. Shazneen was killed at home in Gulshan, Dhaka in 1998 by their household domestic helpers.[17][18] Simeen's youngest son, Faraaz Ayaaz Hossain, was killed in the 2016 Gulshan attack.[18][19]

Rahman died on 1 July 2020 at his residence at Chheora village in Chauddagram Upazila, Cumilla aged 75.[4] He was buried at Banani Graveyard in Dhaka.[4]

gollark: 1MB/s.
gollark: I can service only a few tens of concurrent listeners at 128kbps.
gollark: "osmarks internet radio"™, to be clear, is my internet radio station, streaming random stuff from my music library™ to as many as zero listeners on the interwebnets™.
gollark: Ah, but my internet connection has poor upload speeds.
gollark: Higher bitrate means insignificantly higher RAM usage.

References
  1. "Transcom Chairman Latifur Rahman passes away". Dhaka Tribune. 2020-07-01. Retrieved 2020-06-29.
  2. "Latifur Rahman". Bloomberg. Retrieved 13 July 2016.
  3. "Group of Company Page 4 : Business & Commerce :: bgdportal.com". www.bgdportal.com. Retrieved 2020-02-10.
  4. "Latifur Rahman no more". The Daily Star. 2020-07-01. Retrieved 2020-07-01.
  5. "2012 Honourees". Business for Peace Foundation. Retrieved 2019-08-05.
  6. Hossain, Ahmede (May 25, 2012). "DOING BUSINESS ETHICALLY". The Daily Star. Retrieved July 13, 2016.
  7. Latifur Rahman (19 May 2012). "Latifur Rahman, Chairman & CEO of Transcom Group in Bangladesh - 2012 Business for Peace Award Recipient". vimeo.com. 2lead. Retrieved 10 February 2017.
  8. "Transcom chief dreams big: Latifur Rahman shares his vision in EBL lecture on leadership". The Daily Star. Retrieved 10 February 2017.
  9. "Transcom chief dreams big". The Daily Star. June 12, 2014. Retrieved July 13, 2016.
  10. "New role for Latifur". June 30, 2014. Retrieved July 13, 2016.
  11. "Latifur Rahman re-elected MCCI chief". The Daily Star. 2007-12-31. Retrieved 2020-07-02.
  12. "2012 Honourees". Business for Peace Foundation. Retrieved July 13, 2016.
  13. "Latifur wins Business for Peace Award". The Daily Star. April 18, 2012. Retrieved July 13, 2016.
  14. "Star, P Alo felicitate Latifur Rahman". The Daily Star. 2012-05-31. Retrieved 2020-07-02.
  15. "DU finance dept alumni honour Latifur Rahman". The Daily Star. 2012-06-30. Retrieved 2020-07-02.
  16. "Latifur's banking docs sent to intel agency". Bangladesh News. January 11, 2008. Retrieved July 13, 2016.
  17. "Shazneen's 16th anniversary of death today". The Daily Star. April 23, 2014. Retrieved July 13, 2016.
  18. Anam, Shaheen (July 5, 2016). "A nightmare recurs". The Daily Star. Retrieved July 13, 2016.
  19. "Latifur Rahman's grandson killed". The Daily Star. 2016-07-03. Retrieved 2016-07-13.
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