Tomas Lorenzo, known to have pioneered and to have carved a niche in the development of premium university residences, grabs an opportunity when he sees one.
But his beginnings as an entrepreneur were never into real estate.
Growing up in Mindanao, Lorenzo and his 7 siblings took inspiration from their parents who valued education more than anything: “Have a good education based on what you want to do with your life in the future.” Those words left a huge influence on Lorenzo.
Good education was in fact his father’s ticket to get a job in an American food conglomerate. His mother was one of the first few female doctors to graduate at a national university hospital.
It was not until his father retired that the family actually started to have a business of their own, with a small farm in Davao.
Lorenzo and siblings would spend their summers helping out in the farm which was planted to everything from coffee to silk worm and tomatoes. For Lorenzo, this was probably what sparked the entrepreneurial spirit in him and his siblings.
Back in Manila in grade school, he would walk from their home in Remedios to San Andres to buy his school supplies at the public market. On the way back, he would buy toys and other knick knacks he would then sell to his classmates.
Lorenzo went on to pursue a business degree at the Ateneo de Manila University. Fresh out of college in 1990, Lorenzo was presented with an opportunity to start something on his own, a business he knew nothing about.
Backed by his family, Lorenzo bought a small plastic packaging machine which became the precursor of Agro Plastics Inc., a plastics manufacturing company that catered to Mindanao agriculture. This later became Macondray Plastics Products Inc. that was listed in the stock exchange in 1999.
Lorenzo took the next step and obtained an MBA at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania with a major in finance and a minor in real estate. He would spend a couple of years in finance in the US. He also served as chairman of Lapanday Foods Corp and grew the company to become a fully integrated seed-to-shell agricultural conglomerate catering mostly to international markets.
Lorenzo founded Torre Lorenzo Development Co. in 2000 when he saw the opportunity in student housing.
He saw this huge gap for quality residences for students who who are looking for a premium living space that is safe, has the amenities conducive to learning and is very near top universities.
“At the time, nobody was doing it and I had the opportunity to really make something of it,” he said.
Lorenzo admitted there were a lot of learnings along the way.
The first of TLDC’s university series on Taft avenue was soon followed by another also in the area; another in the university belt and in Las Pinas. Two more are under construction and one is in pre-selling stage.
Lorenzo went on to diversify TLDC to include mixed-used developments and townships, tourism and hospitality in its portfolio. In partnership with Dusit International, TLDC is offering the first Dusit hotel in Davao City and Dusit Thani Lubi Plantation Resort in Davao de Oro.
Nowadays, Lorenzo is working on a new concept that combines residential and accommodation in one of TLDC’s ongoing projects.
Lorenzo is not reinventing the wheel. He merely tweaks existing concepts to fill a void in the market that nobody else is offering.
Although a very much hands-on CEO, Lorenzo acknowledges delegating tasks to the right people makes for a very professionally-run organization.
“An entrepreneur is always on the go, but he has to make sure he does not ignore the back office,” he said. (I. Isip)
