《财富》世界500强黑马：太平洋建设集团掌门人揭秘（节选）

    等到大人物们到场时，昆明云南震庄迎宾馆里已经人头攒动——200多名政府官员和看热闹的人一律身着白衬衫黑西装，等着地方一把手来发布公告。也许是人们的窃窃私语让气氛显得紧张，又或者是宾馆喇叭里播放的《泰坦尼克》主题曲凄婉而庄严，但毫无疑问，将要公布的是一条重磅消息。席琳•迪翁可不会撒谎。

    如果这还不能说明问题，严介和的到来一定可以。作为唯一在第一排就坐的私营企业家和中国最大民营建筑公司——太平洋建设集团（Pacific Construction Group）创始人，严介和干的都不是小事。进门刚刚几秒钟，这位头发灰白的54岁亿万富翁已经笑呵呵地把手搭在了别人的肩膀上。他神采奕奕，声音洪亮——就连拿起麦克风让大家安静的政府官员也很难发出那么大的声音。

    在这个6月初的星期天上午，传出的消息跟严介和本人如出一辙，具有一种奇异的、指数级的传奇色彩。太平洋建设集团将为云南价值600亿美元的工业科技中心区域奠定基础，其中包括全新的住宅区和商业区，还有桥梁和隧道，整个建设面积是洛杉矶的两倍。

    单就太平洋建设集团来说，这份合同至少价值100亿美元，最高可能达到170亿美元，具体数额取决于最终方案。敲定合同条款只用了30天（与之相比，美国历史上最大的私人房地产项目——由Related Real Estate承建的纽约市哈得逊码头去年评估的价值为200亿美元）。

    这就是严介和做生意的风格。规模巨大，行动迅速，令人目眩。

    如果严介和这个名字在国外并不为人们所熟悉，那也不会是严介和的本意。他跟美国前总统比尔•克林顿以及澳大利亚前总理约翰•霍华德关系很好，二人都曾参加严介和在上海举办的年度首席执行官论坛。严介和的个人净资产估计约为30亿美元，在胡润中国富豪榜上占据着显著位置——实际上，和其他富有的同胞不同，严介和从不遮遮掩掩。

    严介和在南京郊外的大别墅里欣然向人们展示了自己的一对椅子（用他的话说就是“世界上最贵的木头”），然后是能容得下八个人的镀金spa按摩浴缸，支撑起居室穹顶的巨型大理石圆柱（每根都用整块大理石雕琢而成）以及直升机停机坪。严介和还提到打算在后院建书房的计划。他忙不迭地说，要修的像悉尼歌剧院一样，只不过会小一些。

    除了行事张扬，严介和还喜欢直言不讳，而这已经给他惹了几次麻烦。他曾公开批评毛主席，还曾因为跟政府官员在生意上激烈争吵而险些锒铛入狱。他和妻子张云芹育有一儿一女，女儿31岁，儿子28岁。由于违反计划生育政策，儿子出生时严介和被罚款1.8万元人民币，在当时约合6000美元。

    20年来，凭借敢作敢为和精明强干，严介和成功超越了国内建筑行业那些根基深厚的竞争对手，其中大多数都是和政府关系密切的国有企业。（财富中文网）

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    译者：Charlie

    By the time the VIP guests arrive, the meeting hall at the Yunnan Zhenzhuang Guest House in the southern city of Kunming is jammed with Communist Party officials and onlookers—some 200 of them, each in the party uniform of black suit and white button-down shirt, all gathered for an announcement from the local party boss. Maybe it’s the nervous chatter of small talk—or perhaps that the theme song to Titanic is playing mournfully, majestically, over the hotel speakers—but there’s little doubt the news will be a
doozy. Celine Dion doesn’t lie.

    If that isn’t a giveaway, the presence of 
Yan Jiehe (pronounced Yen Geah-huh) surely is. Yan, the lone private businessman in the front row and the founder of Pacific Construction Group, China’s largest privately owned builder, doesn’t do anything small. Within seconds of entering the room, the grinning, gray-haired, 54-year-old billionaire has an arm wrapped around someone’s shoulder. His face is reddened with energy. His voice is booming—to the point that when a party official grabs the microphone to settle the crowd, he’s barely as loud as Yan.

    And just like the man, the news on this Sunday morning in early June is oddly, exponentially larger than life. Pacific will build the foundation of a $60 billion industrial and technology hub in this southern Chinese region—an amalgam of entirely new residential and business districts, complete with bridges, and tunnels, encompassing an area twice the size of Los Angeles.

    To Pacific alone, the Kunming contract is worth at least $10 billion and perhaps as much as $17 billion, depending on how the final plans shake out. It took just 30 days to iron out the terms. (For comparison, the largest-ever private real estate deal in the U.S., Related’s Hudson Yards project in New York City, was valued at $20 billion last year; see our story.)

    That’s what makes it a Yan Jiehe deal. Big. Fast. Dizzying.

    If the name Yan Jiehe isn’t familiar outside China, it isn’t by Yan Jiehe’s choice. He’s a buddy of Bill Clinton and former Australian Prime Minister John Howard, both of whom have gone to his annual CEO forum in Shanghai. With a net worth estimated at some $3 billion, Yan has a prominent spot on Hurun Report’slist of China’s richest people—a fact that, unlike some other wealthy compatriots, he makes no effort to hide.

    At his sprawling villa compound outside Nan-jing, China’s former capital, Yan readily shows off a pair of chairs (“The most expensive wood in the world,” he says), then the gilded bathroom spa tub that fits eight, then the massive marble columns (made from single slabs) that hold up the living room—and then the spot where he’s building his helicopter pad. When he describes plans to carve out a new writing den in the backyard, he is quick to say that it will resemble the Sydney Opera House, if a tad smaller.

    Accompanying that ostentation is an outspokenness that has put the businessman at risk on occasion. He has publicly bashed the country’s founding father, Chairman Mao, and nearly gone
to jail after an angry business dispute with government officials. He and his wife, Zhang Yunqin, have a 31-year-old daughter and a 28-year-old son; having the latter required Yan to pay a fine of 18,000 renminbi, or about $6,000 at the time, for violating China’s one-child policy.

    For the past two decades Yan has relied on such brass and gumption to outdo well-entrenched rivals in the Chinese construction industry, most of which are state-owned enterprises (SOEs) with close party ties.