Former Cantopop star and TVB actress Gigi Lai turned to business and property – how did Hong Kong’s ‘Goddess of Beauty’ build and spend her fortune?
Since ending her career in Cantopop, Mandopop, dramas and films, Lai has moved into cosmetics with CosMax and property investment, snapping up real estate in Hong Kong’s most desirable neighbourhoods including Mid-Levels and Repulse Bay
Gigi Lai Chi is a well-known Hong Kong actress under contract to the TVB television channel, dubbed by the media as the “Goddess of Beauty”. Gigi was born to a family of filmmakers and movie stars of the early 20th century, but started out as a singer, releasing albums in Cantonese and Mandarin.
After moving into acting, she appeared in dramas and films, rising to prominence in early 2000 after her performance in TVB series The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber.
Then, in 2008, she shocked the media by suspending her career to take care of her brother Stephen Li’s skin care business after he had been involved in a serious car accident.
Gigi dropped another bombshell in February 2009 when she tied the knot with billionaire businessman, Patrick Ma Ting-kung, a family member of the Oriental Press Group, Hong Kong’s largest media group. He bought a US$9 million duplex unit in Branksome Grande, in Hong Kong’s affluent Mid-Levels neighbourhood, as a wedding gift and sent her to a private hospital in Sydney, Australia, when she fell pregnant in 2010.
Following on from her entertainment career, Lai started a cosmetics business CosMax which she floated as Miricor Enterprises Holdings Limited on the Hong Kong stock exchange in 2017, becoming the CEO and chairwoman of a medical beauty enterprise worth US$29 million.