History
The Ayala ancestors were from northern Spain’s mountainous region of the Basque Country, where Juan Larrazabal Ayala (circa 1475) was an influential landowner. The immigrant ancestor Antonio de Ayala sailed for Manila in the 19th century. There he established an industrial partnership with Domingo Roxas, and later with Dr. Johannes Andreas Zobel, a German pharmacist from Hamburg, who settled in Manila in 1832. Roxas was a descendant of Mexican immigrant Antonio Fernández de Roxas of Acapulco, who migrated to the Philippines in 1695 as an early colonist.
The Roxas clan has resided in the Philippines for more than 20 generations. Historically, the family has been well known for their socio-economic and cultural contributions to the country, such as the pioneering of Manila's first rail system in the 20th century, establishing the oldest existing financial institution in Southeast Asia, as well as the construction of the first steel bridges in the Philippines. They had the first private plane in the Philippines, which they named Prima Zobelina.
The Zóbel de Ayalas own and control the Ayala Corporation, the country's largest and oldest conglomerate that includes the Bank of the Philippine Islands, Ayala Land Inc., the Manila Water Company, and Globe Telecom, one of the largest mobile phone networks in the Philippines. The Ayala Corporation was also responsible for developing large areas of Makati City into residential subdivisions (gated communities) between the 1940s and 1960s. These subdivisions include Forbes Park, Dasmariñas Village, Bel-Air Village, San Lorenzo Village, Urdaneta Village, San Antonio Village, and Magallanes Village. In addition, Ayala Corporation later developed the center of Makati into a mixed-use industrial development now known as the Ayala Center and its surrounding throughfares (Ayala Avenue, Makati Avenue, Paseo de Roxas & Sen. Gil Puyat Ave.), which now comprise the Makati skyline. In 2001, the family acquired the 54-hectare Fort Bonifacio Global City development in Metro Manila. Other industrial and real estate developments also exist in other parts of Luzon and Cebu including several international partnerships in banking, construction and Information Technology.
Read more about this topic: Zobel De Ayala Family
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