United Overseas Bank (UOB) announced on Tuesday the appointment of Tan Choon Hin as the head of ASEAN and Greater China, a new role within the company. Tan, who currently serves as UOB’s deputy chief risk officer, is scheduled to begin his new duties on September 1. He will report directly to UOB Chief Executive Officer Wee Ee Cheong.
The creation of the role occurs as UOB aims to increase regional connectivity and capture cross-border financial flows between the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the Greater China region. The bank operates fully-owned subsidiaries in Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam, and mainland China, along with branches in Hong Kong and Taiwan.
In his new capacity, Tan will manage these regional subsidiaries and branches while overseeing the bank's foreign direct investment (FDI) advisory unit. This unit is designed to assist companies with cross-border growth by linking them to industry networks and ecosystem partners throughout the two regions. According to the bank, the FDI unit supported more than 300 expansion plans involving S$5.6 billion ($4.38 billion) in projected investments over the last six months.
On a broader scale, the move involves the management of assets and investment advisory services that impact thousands of corporate entities. In the last half-year alone, the FDI unit Tan will oversee managed projections totaling approximately $14.6 million per expansion plan on average across 300 cases. Business owners and regional managers will likely notice these changes in how they access UOB’s ecosystem partners and industry networks starting in September, as the bank seeks to streamline its cross-border connectivity.
The consolidation of these regions under one head sets a precedent for how Singaporean banks may structure their regional growth to compete for trade flows between ASEAN and Greater China. By placing the FDI advisory unit under this new leadership, UOB is positioning itself to be a primary intermediary for international trade and investment. What happens next is the formal transition of leadership on September 1, which will determine how the bank executes its strategy to capture increasing cross-border flows in the coming fiscal quarters.