Billionaire Kishin RK Carves A Tasty Niche Amid Pandemic With TiffinLabs

This story is part of Forbes’ coverage of Singapore’s Richest 2020. See our full coverage here.

Talk about prescient: about a year before the pandemic, billionaire property developer Kishin RK cofounded an online meal delivery company, TiffinLabs. Now the company is busy catering to Singaporeans facing government-imposed limits on in-restaurant dining. “We see an absolute outburst and explosion of the food delivery business globally,” Kishin told a Forbes Asia Next Frontiers Webinar on June 23.

TiffinLabs differs from many online takeout companies. Rather than deliver food from brick-and-mortar restaurants, centralized kitchens prepare food that can be ordered from virtual restaurants. Kishin’s food foray provides a welcome hedge against the downturn in his real estate business, as Kishin’s RB Capital and dad Raj Kumar’s Royal Holdings own hotels and other property in Malaysia and Singapore. Kishin, 37, and Kumar, 66, saw their combined fortune remain little changed at $2.6 billion.

TiffinLabs’ outlook is bright. “We’re seeing a shift in terms of people behaving very differently,” said Kishin, TiffinLabs’ chairman. “It’s going to stick for a long time.” The trend of takeouts from centralized kitchens will help double global online delivery sales to $200 billion by 2025 from its size in 2018, according to U.S. researcher Frost & Sullivan.

TiffinLabs is now going global. In June, TiffinLabs leased more than 1,000 cloud kitchens in Asia, Europe and the U.S. Due to fire up in the fourth quarter, these kitchens will allow the firm to reach over 10 markets worldwide. “We’re bringing our restaurant brands here in Singapore global,” said Kishin.