A taipan (, literally "top class"), sometimes spelled tai-pan, is a foreign-born senior business executive or entrepreneur operating in mainland China or Hong Kong. The term Taipan also refers to the mixed political, social, and business oligarch families in the Philippines. Historical variant spellings include taepan (first appearance) and typan.
In popular culture
The term gained wide currency outside China after the publication of Somerset Maugham's 1922 short story "The Taipan" and James Clavell's 1966 novel Tai-Pan, which was adapted into a 1986 film of the same name, directed by Daryl Duke.
Taipan! is a 1979 video game where the player is 19th-century trader who sails between several east Asian ports buying opium, silk and firearms to re-sell at higher prices.
The term was used to describe the protagonist's family in J. G. Ballard's 1984 novel Empire of the Sun.
Notable taipans
- Anthony John Liddell Nightingale, Jardine Matheson (2006–2012), Hong Kong
- William Jardine, Jardine Matheson (1843–1845), Hong Kong
- James Matheson, Jardine Matheson (1796–1878), Hong Kong
- Lawrence Kadoorie, China Light and Power (1899–1993), Hong Kong
- Alasdair Morrison, Jardine Matheson (1994–2000), Hong Kong
- Simon Murray, Hutchison Whampoa (1984–1994), Hong Kong
- Percy Weatherall (born 1957), Jardine Matheson, Hong Kong
- William Keswick (1834–1912), Scotland
- Merlin Bingham Swire (born 1973), England
- Douglas Lapraik (1818–1869), England
- John Johnstone Paterson (1886–1971), Jardine Matheson, Hong Kong
See also
- Canton System, the single-port trading monopoly operative in China prior to the First Opium War.
- Thirteen Factories