Edmond Leka, Chairman, Union Bank
An engineer who started his career with KeSH, the state electricity utility, Mr Leka joined the public administration in the mid-1990s.
He oversaw the public investment budget during the Democratic party’s first term in office, working closely with donor organisations and international financial institutions.
He moved to the private sector in 1997 to help his brother expand the Western Union franchise in Albania, after the collapse of a series of fraudulent pyramid investment schemes brought down the government.
The Western Union network has grown steadily, as remittances from migrant workers increased, and has added courier and travel services. Two years ago, Mr Leka founded Union Bank, a commercial lender that has opened 25 branches around the country and has gathered assets of more than €70m ($109m).
While Albania’s banking sector seems crowded, with 17 domestic and foreign lenders competing for business, he believes there is room for a flexible retail lender.
Network expansion will focus on fast-growing smaller towns along the highway heading north from Tirana. “These places are seeing a lot more economic activity but are seriously underbanked,” Mr Leka says.
He expects to wrap up a deal later this year to sell a minority stake in Union Bank to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
“Our aim is to become a leading retail bank, not just in Albania but in Kosovo and Macedonia too,” he says.
Samir Mane, President, QTU
Mr Mane left Korce in south Albania in 1991 to study geology in Vienna. He spent less than a year at university – “basically I learned German there” – before setting up his own company to sell televisions and video recorders in Albania.
Wholesale prices were cheap because Austria was the centre for exporting white and brown goods to eastern Europe, offering entrepreneurs such as Mr Mane an opportunity to earn high profits. “To keep down transport costs, we’d put a dozen items on the bus to Tirana,” he says.
Neptun, his Vienna-based consumer electronics business, has 21 outlets in Albania, Bosnia-Hercegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia and Serbia.
His next retailing venture was Euromax, now the biggest Albanian supermarket chain and preparing to expand in Bosnia alongside an international partner. The EBRD is an investor, providing €9.5m ($14.8m) in debt and equity financing.
Two years ago, Mr Mane opened Qendra Tregtare Univers, the country’s first shopping mall.
His businesses have more than 1,200 employees, including senior managers from Canada, Greece and India. He plans to invest €46m to build another QTU mall in Tirana, which will include an entertainment complex with a six-screen cinema. “We intend to have malls in every Albanian city with more than 100,000 residents, and a small one in Korce because it’s my home town,” he says.
All the malls will include a Euromax hypermarket. “We’re building islands of European quality in what’s still very much a developing market,” Mr Mane says.
Alban Xhillari, President, Millennium group
Alban Xhillari’s first high-profile venture was the construction of the Millennium Cinema in Tirana in the early 1990s when the capital had few entertainment venues other than noisy cafés and bars.
“It made a huge difference being able to see foreign films in a comfortable environment,” he says.
He has since used profits from building apartment blocks in the city’s new residential districts to finance several high-end office and commercial buildings projects designed by international architects as part of central Tirana’s re-development plan.
Construction is under way on the first project, the American Business Centre, located in the Blokk, a mixed residential and commercial district where the communist elite used to live. Gleeds, an international construction management consultancy, is project manager.
“We need some imaginative new architecture to define the 21st century capital, but we have to make sure we build to European Union standards,” Mr Xhillari says.
Outside the capital, he has launched a €20m ($31m) project to convert the former summer palace of King Zog, an art deco building on a hilltop above Durres with a spectacular view over the Adriatic, into a small luxury resort.
Dritan Hoxha, President, Top Media
When news broke of the disastrous explosion at a military depot outside Tirana, Albanians turned to Top Channel, a private television station owned by Dritan Hoxha that has acquired a reputation for independent reporting.
The group also controls Top Albania Radio – Mr Hoxha’s first broadcasting venture – and Shqip, an independent daily newspaper with the country’s third-largest circulation.
Mr Hoxha is also the main shareholder in Digitalb, the country’s first digital television platform, which has attracted an estimated 100,000 subscribers.
Top Channel has brought “Big Brother” to Albania, while the most popular of Digitalb’s 14 channels broadcasts European premier league football.
Mr Hoxha, 39, who started his business career as an importer of coffee, is a controversial media magnate. He has clashed with the conservative government over regulation of satellite broadcasting rights and has rebuffed allegations of tax evasion. But he is staunchly defended by free-speech activists and the political opposition.
