Ho Ching now 17th on Forbes’ Most Powerful Women list

Ho Ching, the CEO and executive director of Temasek, as well as wife of Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, is now ranked 17th on Forbes’ World’s 100 Most Powerful Women list.

Ho’s 2018 ranking is 11 spots higher than last year’s. She has been on the list for the past 14 years. In 2017 she was ranked the 28th most powerful woman in the world, and in 2016, she was 30th.

Her entry reads: “Ho Ching has been at Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund Temasek for 16 years and has helped its portfolio grow to over $235 billion.

Temasek was one of the main investors in a $14 billion dollar fundraising round by Ant Financial, an affiliate of Alibaba.

Ching opened offices in San Francisco last year and poured over a quarter of Temasek’s money into sectors like life sciences, tech, and agribusiness.

Ho Ching is also the wife of Singaporean Prime Minister, Lee Hsien Loong.”

Singaporean Jenny Lee is also in this year’s list. She is a managing partner at GGV Capital and is ranked 87th on Forbes’ 2018 list. According to the magazine, Lee is one of the most respected venture capital investors in China.

That’s not the only list Lee is on, she ranks 74th on The Midas List of top tech investors in 2018.

Her entry reads: “Managing partner at GGV Capital since 2005, Lee is widely considered to be one of the most respected venture capital investors in China.

Last month GGV Capital closed $1.88 billion in funds, one of the largest global raises for a VC firm in 2018.

Lee’s investment portfolio ranges from whimsical moonshots like eHang184, China’s first flying taxi, to Lingochamp, an A.I. language-learning bot.

One of her investments, social media company, YY, has appreciated over 10x since its public offering in November 2012.”

The Forbes list has been published since 2003 and includes powerful women from the whole spectrum of fields. Angela Merkel took the top rank for the eighth year in a row (13 times in all). At numbers 2 and 3 respectively are Theresa May, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and Christine Lagarde, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund.

Read related: Ho Ching still receives flak, even though now her pouch costs S$48, instead of S$15