¡SupereXtraordinarisimo!: In Focus: Jaime Zobel de Ayala and Family (Ayala Corporation & Premio Zobel)

THE ZOBEL DE AYALA FAMILY

The Zóbel de Ayala clan is an affluent Filipino business family with ancestry from the Philippines, and northern Spain’s mountainous region of Álava descending from the lineage of Juan Larrazábal Ayala (circa 1475), an influential landowner. Patriarch Antonio de Ayala sailed for Manila in the 1800s and established an industrial partnership with Domingo Roxas, a descendant of Mexican immigrant Antonio Fernández de Roxas of Acapulco, who migrated to the Philippines in 1695, and later with Dr. Johannes Andreas Zobel, a German pharmacist from Hamburg who settled in Manila in 1832.

The clan has been residing in the Philippines for more than 20 generations. Historically, the family has been well-known for their socio-economic and cultural contributions to the country such as the pioneering of Manila's first rail system in the 1900's, establishing the oldest existing financial institution in Southeast Asia, as well as the construction of the first steel bridges in the Philippines.

The Zóbel de Ayalas own and control the Ayala Corporation, the country's largest and oldest conglomerate that includes the Bank of the Philippine Islands, Ayala Land Inc., the Manila Water Company, and Globe Telecom, one of the largest mobile phone networks in the Philippines. The Ayala Corporation was also responsible for developing large areas of Makati City into residential subdivisions (gated communities) between the 1940s and 1960s. These subdivisions include Forbes Park, Dasmariñas Village, Bel-Air Village, San Lorenzo Village, Urdaneta Village and Magallanes Village.

In addition, Ayala Corporation later developed the center of Makati into a mixed-use industrial development now known as the Ayala Center and its surrounding throughfares (Ayala Avenue, Makati Avenue, Paseo de Roxas & Sen. Gil Puyat Ave.), which now comprise the Makati skyline. In 2001, the family acquired the 54-hectare Fort Bonifacio Global City development in Metro Manila. Other industrial and real estate developments also exist in other parts of Luzon and Cebu including several international partnerships in banking, construction and Information Technology.

The De La Salle-Santiago Zóbel School was named after Jacobo Santiago Zóbel (1954-1965), the eldest son of Enrique Zobel. The Premio Zobel Award has been annually given by the family for the past eighty years in recognition to outstanding citizens who propagate the intellectual development of the country. The prestigious Ayala Foundation has been assisting the country's struggling cultural heritage and development for many years.

CEO Jaime Augusto Zóbel de Ayala II is among the three Filipino individuals included in the Forbes magazine's list of the World's Richest people, ranking 349th in 2007.

Zobel de Ayala Patriachs' resting place in San Agustin Church, Intramuros, Manila

The Ayala Family &Premio Zobel's History

THE AYALA CORPORATION

Ayala Corporation is a holding company for the diversified interests of the Ayala Group. It was founded in 1834 and is the oldest and largest conglomerate operating in the Philippines. The company has a portfolio of diverse business interests including investments in real estate, banking, telecommunications, electronics, information technology, water infrastructure and management and business process outsourcing.

In the late 1800s, Ayala participated in the construction of the Colgante and the Ayala bridges and in 1888, it introduced the first tramcar service in the Philippines. Ayala was mainly responsible for the development of Makati as the financial district of the Philippines.

Ayala was recently named (2007) by Asiamoney as the country's best managed large-capitalization company.