Country Heights Holdings Berhad is embracing the expansion of its business into new sectors including digital banking and investment, in addition to tokenising real estate.
According to the group's founder, Tan Sri Lee Kim Yew, with the fast-expanding technical development and digital banking services, it is obvious that these technologies will have a big impact on how people's banking demands and daily activities develop in the future.
"I strongly believe that digital banking is the way forward, as it will revolutionise the whole banking ecosystem, and fundamentally transform the way that financial institutions operate," he said in an interview.
Lee said this is one of the main reasons why he established L1 Bank, which is a consolidation of Golden Touch Investment Bank and Golden Horse Digital Investment Bank, both fully regulated and licensed under the Labuan Financial Services Authority.
He wants to make banking and financing simple, transparent, and convenient by using advanced technologies, such as the "ABCDE" which stands for A.I., blockchain, crypto, data, and e-commerce.
"For example, we can make use of Security Token Offering (STO) to digitalise our physical assets. The security tokens allow us to prove and verify our ownership on blockchain and make it easy to transact and transfer the underlying physical properties through online services.
"As we know, all transactions on the blockchain are safe, secure, and transparent. Tokenising real estate can also make it easier to track ownership and transfer ownership, as it can be done on a secure and transparent blockchain platform. Therefore, you don't need to worry about the security of our platform," he said.
Lee thinks that the virtual economy cannot exist in a vacuum, as seen by the recent FTX events in the United States,
He asserted that all economies, whether digital or virtual, require a genuine physical foundation.
"In L1 Bank and Country Heights, this is exactly what we are doing. I believe we are the first-ever digital bank in the world that provides security for all investment capital. This is the same thing that we are doing here at Country Heights. When we do STO, we will use the real asset to back up the digital tokens, so all investments will be secured," Lee said.
Lee is convinced that the way real estate is purchased and sold could undergo a revolution.
He said Country Heights will launch its digital bank services and its tokens soon.
Apart from offering discounts for property purchases, it plans to expand the tokens to include the whole Country Heights ecosystem, including hotel and dining, healthcare and medical check-ups, and golfing experiences.
"As an entrepreneur in the real estate industry, I always strive and hope to leave a positive impact on society. Country Height's motto - "Ever searching for a better living" is exactly such a manifestation and also a constant reminder that we want to improve the lives of others by continuously searching for a better living, especially for those living in urban society to embrace the country living concept," Lee said.
Moving forward, Country Heights properties and the group will be transformed to not only continue to pursue the country-living concept but also to adopt technologies and digitalisation into the living environment, he said.
The idea is also to enhance the assets and leverage the infrastructure to directly benefit from the growth in digitalisation.
"By doing this, we can expand our business and increase our offerings. This includes turning Mines Resort City into a fully-enabled smart city," Lee said.
Country Heights, which successfully converted the largest open-cast mining site in the world into Mines Resort City, the largest environmental development project ever undertaken in Malaysia's history plans to launch 1,000 terrace homes with the 5S Concept, which stands for Sport, Solar, Security, Service and Smart Living at 10 locations nationwide.
Lee hopes to revive the real estate sector following the pandemic with these ground-breaking developments.