Bridge between 2 nations

AT the age of 98, China-born businessman Tao Shing Pee has the keenness of a far younger man, but the manners of an old world gentleman.

He rises from his seat to greet you personally at his sprawling penthouse apartment in a complex built by his property business, Shing Kwan Group. Surrounded by the expansive greenery of Bukit Timah, the condominium harks back to an earlier era - solid, substantial and without the showy opulence that marks newer developments.

Mr Tao is much the same. For a man who has been involved in the inner circles of big business and deal-making in Singapore and China for over five decades, the Chinese national-turned-Singaporean carries no airs about him.