タイにおける地方小売財閥の形成と展開

-タントラーパン・グループの事例-

抄録

As the consumption market expanded in local cities in Thailand in the 1980s, some leading provincial retailers diversified their business rapidly and became “local retail zaibatsu.” Tantraphan Group in Chiangmai city is a typical example.
There are two main factors that lead the Tantraphan Group to the rapid expansion and diversification of its retail business. The first factor concerned the character of the local consumption market. Although local markets were expanding, the geographical extent was limited to urban areas. Moreover, big distribution companies from Bangkok as well as local companies entered the limited market, while finance companies expanded their lending business in local cities. Under such market conditions, the Tantraphan Group did not specialize in a specific field of retail business but chose to diversify. The second factor was the characteristic of the family business of the Tantraphan Group. The ownership and management of the group companies were concentrated in the group leader. The group leader could, therefore, make prompt decisions in expanding and diversifying the business.
As excessive competition in the local market was obvious in the 1990s, the Tantraphan Group faced a financial crisis and finally decided to sell its department store and shopping center section at a loss to the CRC Group of Bangkok. At the same time, the Tantraphan Group decided to establish a holding company consisting of only the founder's family members and reinforced ownership and control of its subsidiary companies. This behavioral pattern indicates that the group intended to preserve the family property by all means. In this respect the group clearly demonstrated its characteristic as a family business and zaibatsu.
At the same time, the Tantraphan Group, to some extent, transferred the authority of its practical business affairs to professional managers. Although it is not clear yet in what forms local zaibatsu will exist in the future, it is surely very difficult for them to expand their business in the unchanged form of family business. The case of the Tantraphan Group shows that local zaibatsu must carry out some kind of reform in their business management, just as the big zaibatsu in Bangkok did.