IVAN KO - Chairman
Ivan Ko is currently the Chairman of RECAS and CEO of Victoria Harbor Group. He was the Founding Chairman 2002 - 2004 and Chairman of China Real Estate Chamber of Commerce Hong Kong and International Chapter 2012 - 2018.
He has 27 years of real estate development and real estate finance experience in Hong Kong, China, Macau, US and UK. In the 90s, Ivan worked in a Hong Kong developer and managed several real estate development and land development projects in Beijing, among others, two office developments in Beijing Finance Street and a land development project on 2nd Ring Road East. Subsequently, Ivan was the Group Deputy General Manager of a listed Hong Kong developer Hing Kong Holdings Limited in charge of a portfolio of development projects and rental income properties in Hong Kong, a large residential development project in Beijing and a residential development project in Dalian.
Ivan was the Chairman and CEO of a mortgage service company – Advantage China Limited, he set up in JV with the International Finance Corporation (The World Bank), Deutsche Bank, Netherlands Development Finance Company (FMO) and another institutional investor. During that period, he helped the newly set up China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC) in standardization of residential mortgage application and underwriting process. Also, he was appointed by CBRC to draft the first “Real Estate Lending Guidelines for Commercial Banks” and was promulgated. He has made significant contributions to the policy exploration of asset securitization in China during that time.
Ivan also involved in establishing several real estate funds including the early stage of China Real Estate Elite Fund. He was later appointed the Managing Director and Head of Real Estate Asset Management of two listed financial institutions - SW Kingsway Capital Holdings Limited and Value Convergence Holdings Limited, in which, he set up real estate fund for the China and Macau market. These include a 50:50 JV with one of the most reputable Japanese Groups - Marubeni to co-own and co-asset manage a serviced apartment in Beijing and a 50:50 GP JV with Macqurie Capital for the Macau Property Development Fund in 2007-2008 .
Ivan set up his real estate service company in 2004 – Real Estate Capital Asset Services Limited which was later renamed as RECAS in 2009.
On public services, in the first few years of 2000, he was a Director of the Hong Kong Policy Research Institute for several years, a member of the Personal Data (Privacy) Advisory Committee in Hong Kong.
Ivan was the Founding Chairman of China Real Estate Chamber of Commerce Hong Kong and International Chapter 2002-2004 and was re-elected in 2012 and served as Chairman till 2018. He is now a member of the Board of a NGO Walk DVRC Ltd and a member of its Steering Committee. Ivan is also a Walking Expert of a Hong Kong think tank Civic Exchange.
Ivan started his real estate career with marketing of Beijing projects several years after he graduated with a business degree from Chinese University of Hong Kong. He later studied the Real Estate Development Master Degree course in University of Hong Kong. He also attended the Real Estate Finance Program of the Wharton School of University of Pennsylvania and a mortgage service course in the School of Mortgage Banking of America.