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30 Little Known Facts We Bet You Didn’t Know About Frank Lowy

6 February 2019, 5:25 pm EST By Ruby Karnick

Sir Frank Lowy, the former long-time Chairman of Westfield Corporation, is one of the richest people in Australia, even after having sold a part of his giant establishment. Here are some interesting facts about the Australian-Israeli businessman:

• He is one of the nation's five leading living philanthropists with a commemorative postage stamp, as the Australia Post honored him for his contribution to philanthropy as a part of the Australian Legends series in the year 2008.
• He is one of the few people to have been listed on every Financial Review Rich List, formerly the BRW Rich 200 list, since its very first publication in the year 1983.
• He was appointed a Companion of the Order of Australia for his service to the community as philanthropist committed to support of wide-ranging social and cultural endeavors in the year 2000.
• He was awarded the title of Australia’s leading philanthropist by peak body, Philanthropy Australia, with donations of A$10 million only in the year 2002.
• Lowy established the Lowy Institute for International Policy, an independent think tank to conduct research about international political, strategic and economic issues from an Australian perspective in April 2003, marking the 50th anniversary of his arrival in Australia.
• He was honored with the Woodrow Wilson Award for Corporate Citizenship by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in the year 2005, for the establishment of the Lowy Institute.
• He was awarded with the Henni Friedlander Award for the Common Good at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, United States, on October 2, 2007.
• In 2010, Lowy and his family donated A$10 million to facilitate the construction of the UNSW Lowy Cancer Research Center, a collaborative centre of the Children’s Cancer Institute Australia and the Faculty of Medicine at the University of New South Wales.
• He was knighted in the 2017 Queen's Birthday Honors (UK) for his services to business and philanthropy.
• He along with the Packer family is said to have donated an undisclosed amount towards the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute, in 2008.

• Sir Frank P. Lowy was born on October 22, 1930 in Czechoslovakia, which is now known as Slovakia, but was forced to live in a ghetto in Hungary during World War II.
• In the year 1946, he made his way to France and boarded the ship Yagur, which was headed to Mandatory Palestine, but was caught en route by British authorities and interned in a detention camp in Cyprus.
• He joined the Haganah, then the Golani Brigade, and fought in the 1948 Arab–Israeli War in the Galilee and Gaza.
• He joined his family who travelled to Australia from Europe in the year 1952 and started a small business delivering goods.
• A year later, he met John Saunders, a fellow immigrant, with whom he would eventually partner and create Westfield Development Corporation through the development of a shopping center at Blacktown in Sydney's western suburbs.
• Lowy and Saunders together developed shopping centers across Australia, and even in the United States from 1977, until Saunders sold his interests and left the company in 1987.
• The partners listed the company as Westfield Development Corporation for the first time on the Australian Stock Exchange in the year 1960.
• Shortly after Saunders left the business, Lowy took over fully and started developing shopping centers in New Zealand and then in the United Kingdom in the 2000s.
• In the year 1995, he was appointed as the Director of the Reserve Bank of Australia, a position he held till 2005, after being reappointed in 2000 and 2003.
• He, at the age of 80, officially stood down as the Executive Chairman of the Westfield Group in October 2010, while his sons Steven and Peter became the joint chief executives. He remained as the Non-Executive Chairman of the company.

• He was 85 years old, when he stepped down from the role as the chairman of the Scentre Group in October 2015, after having held on to the realm for 55 years.
• He is a long time supporter of Association Football and was the Chairman of the Football Federation Australia (FFA) from 2003 to November 2015.
• He is said to have commenced a campaign to host the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Australia backed with $43 million in support from the Australian Government in the year 2007.
• He met his wife Shirley at a Jewish dance, when he was around 21 years old. The couple got married and have three sons - Peter, Steven and David.
• His sons Peter and Steven manage the Westfield business, while his son David manages the family's private investments. Peter is also the chairman of Tribe Media Corp, the parent of the Jewish Journal. Peter also served as chairman of the University of Judaism.
• His wife Shirley Lowy is the founder of the Chai Foundation which is dedicated to finding and funding research into effective but less toxic forms of cancer therapy.
• Lowy Family owns a super yacht named Ilona, after his mother that houses 8 cabins for guests. The value of the Yacht is estimated to be around US$ 80 million.
• During an A-League trophy presentation in 2015, he reportedly fell off the stage, and had to undergo a surgery to resolve the complication from his fall.
• In December 2017, it was announced that the Lowy family have sold the Westfield shopping centers to French property giant Unibail-Rodamco for $32.7 billion. The deal does not include the Scentre Group.
• With the new takeover deal, Lowy will be the chair of a newly created advisory board for Unibail-Rodamco, while his son Peter Lowy will be one of two Westfield board members appointed to the supervisory board of Unibail-Rodamco.

• Frank Lowy Net Worth: $6.5 Billion

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Steven Lowy confirmed as the $14.2 million buyer of Camp Cove offering

Steven Lowy, the retailing family scion, has been finally confirmed as the mystery $14.2 million buyer of a rare Camp Cove offering.

The confirmation comes after he and wife Judy lodged plans to add the acquisition into their existing compound where their three land acquisitions have totalled $25.7 million.

They have been on the beach at Watsons Bay since 1991 when they  commissioned a contemporary house by Allen Jack Cottier , which won the 1994 Wilkinson Award for outstanding architecture.  

The Lowys bought their original beachfront block from nightclub owner Robbie Griff for $2.5 million, ignoring previously approved Rod Learoyd house plans in favour of a design by Peter Stronach.

It was late last year when the 525 square metre beachfront Victoria Street block with a single level weatherboard cottage sold under the hammer.

It was knocked down the veteran property developer Philip Wolanski, who advised he was representing an undisclosed buyer.

It was quickly mooted they were the neighbours, the Lowy family.

Held for over nine decades, it was sold by the Webb family.

The Valuer General had previously valued the property at $8.5 million.

The neighbours have bolstered the Lowy's approval prospects by writing a letter to "support Steven and Judy Lowy's proposed plans".

The $2.1 million plans lodged by Tim Allison Associates include rebuilding a sea wall and adding a new landscaped beachfront garden for privacy and re-opening the veranda.

They even plan to reinstate chimneys.

The Lowy's three adjoining beachfront properties along the beach total 2,590 square metres. 

The family's prior expansion came in 2009 spending $9 million on another 1,000 square metres bought from Karen Beck, using another mate, Simon Wilkenfeld as the purchasing stalking horse.

This article was first published in the Saturday Daily Telegraph. 

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Lowy family agrees $16bn Westfield sale to focus on investments

One of Australia's most prominent business families is to sell down its stake in the iconic mall operator they grew from the Western suburbs of Sydney to 35 sites across the US and Europe.

Founder Frank Lowy, 87, and his family have agreed to sell most of its stake in Westfield Corporation in a $16 billion deal with French retail giant Unibail-Rodamco – Australia's largest ever takeover.

The Lowy family is expected to gain around $2 billion from the transaction with around $700 million in cash, and the remainder in Unibail-Rodamco securities.

Lowy will retire as chairman of Westfield and become chair of a newly created advisory board, to provide independent advice from outside experts on its strategy.

Current second-generation co-chief executives Peter Lowy and Steven Lowy will retire with Peter joining the supervisory board.

Lowy said his family, including his sons Peter, Steven and David, wanted to change their roles by becoming investors, rather than operators, he told media during a press briefing.

The family's private investments are controlled via Lowy Family Group, its family office and private investment business with offices in New York and Sydney.

The Lowy family will retain control of Westfield's retail technology platform, OneMarket, which will be spun off into a new company on the Australian Stock Exchange, with Steven Lowy remaining as chairman.

It comes at the same time that e-commerce giant Amazon.com is turning traditional retail shopping on its head and follows Amazon's recent opening in Australia.

The sale follows a strategic split in 2014 which saw the European and US assets retained in Westfield Corporation, while its Australian and New Zealand businesses were spun off into a new listed entity, Scentre Group.

Frank Lowy, a Holocaust survivor, co-founded Westfield Plaza in 1959 with John Saunders which grew into Westfield Corporation boasting malls from London's Shepherd's Bush complex to Westfield World Trade Center in New York.

Westfield Corporation reported revenues of $1.8 billion for the 2016 financial year.

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$14.2 million home buy gives CEO five waterfront blocks

Thanks to a $14.2 million purchase of the house next door, Westfield co-chief executive Steven Lowy is reportedly now the proud owner of a block of Sydney waterfront properties consisting of no fewer than five lots. Although real-estate agents Bradfield Cleary remained tight-lipped about the identity of the cashed-up buyer, residents of the Watsons Bay suburb were in no doubt about who it was. Lowy has been a devoted fan of his Camp Cove location since 1991, when he paid $2.5 million for a double block on which he commissioned an award-winning contemporary home by architect Peter Stronach of Allen Jack Cottier.

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