Express Media Group
Express Media Group was founded in 1998 with the launch of an Urdu daily, Express. Since then, it has also been publishing an English language daily, Express Tribune, a Sindhi language daily, Sindh Express, and some television channels including Express News and Express Entertainment. It owns and runs three of the ten most viewed news websites in Pakistan – www.express.pk, www.express.com.pk and www.tribune.com.pk – as well. The group includes several media companies such as Television Media Network Private Limited (that owns and runs television channels), Express Publications Private Limited (which owns and runs newspapers) and Express Digital Private Limited (which runs websites).
Express Media Group itself is a part of a larger business conglomerate, Lakson Group. Its business portfolio includes agriculture-based industry, call centers, non-durables consumer goods, fast food, financial services, media, paper and board, printing and packaging, information technology, power generation, drug manufacturing and travel.
The Lakson group is owned and run by four brothers – Sultan Ali Lakhani, Amin Muhammad Lakhani, Zulfiqar Ali Lakhani and Iqbal Lakhani – and their children. They have overlapping ownerships in various businesses of Lakson Group but have divided their management rather neatly. So, while Sultan Ali Lakhani and his son Bilal Ali Lakhani run Express Media Group almost exclusively, other businesses of the group are run by other members of their family.
The family is also closely linked to other members of Pakistan’s business elite. For instances, Danish Ali Lakhani, who is a nephew of Sultan Ali Lakhani, is married to Nazafreen Saigol who is the deputy chief executive of Dawn Media Group and whose father Azam Saigol was a part of Saigol Group, an old and large business house which has its headquarters in Lahore and has a highly diverse and successful business portfolio.
Mother Company
Lakson Group
Business Form
Private
Legal Form
Not a registered group
Business Sectors
Agriculture-based industry; Call centers; non-durables consumer goods; fast food; financial services; media; paper and board; printing and packaging; information technology; power generation; drug manufacturing; travel
Individual Owner
Other Print Outlets
Express Tribune (English daily)
Sindh Express (Sindhi daily)
Other TV Outlets
Express Entertainment
Express 24/7
Other Online Outlets
https://food.tribune.com.pk
https://sindhexpress.com.pk/epaper/index.aspx
https://www.expressentertainment.tv/
Media Business
Publishing
Century Publications Private Limited
Express Digital Private Limited
Publishing and printing
Matrix Press Private Limited
Publishing and broadcasting
Express publications Private Limited
Television broadcasting
Television Media Network Private Limited
Business
Investment management
Siza Private Limited
Construction
Siza Services Private Limited
Paper and Packaging
Century Paper and Board Mills
Merit Packaging Limited
Fast moving consumer goods
Colgate-Palmolive Company Pakistan
Food and agriculture
Ajinomoto Lakson Pakistan Private Limited
Siza Commodities Private Limited
Siza Foods Private Limited
Healthcare
Siza International Private Limited
Travel
Princeton Travels Private Limited
Power Generation
Lakson Wind Power Generation Private Limited
Lakson Power Limited
Information technology and communication
Cybernet
StormFiber
Rapid Compute
Sybrid (Private) Limited
Lakson Business Solutions Limited
Ice Animations
Financial services
Century Insurance Company Limited
Lakson Investments Limited
General Information
Founding Year
1998
Affiliated Interests Founder
born in 1948 in Gondia, a town in what is now India’s Maharashtra state. His family subsequently moved to Karachi where his father Hassanali Karabhai set up a business in 1954. Over time, this business would expand and become Lakson Group which is now one of the largest commercial and industrial conglomerates in Pakistan.
Sultan Ali Lakhani worked as the group’s chairman till 1988 and is serving as its advisor presently. He is also the chief executive officer of Express Media Group which is wholly owned by Lakson Group and includes Television Media Network Private Limited (that owns and runs some television channels including Express News and Express Entertainment), Express Publications Private Limited (which owns and runs Urdu language daily Express, English language daily Express Tribune and Sindhi language daily Sindh Express), and Express Digital Private Limited (which runs three major news websites – www.express.com.pk, www.express.pk and www.tribune.com.pk – among others).
Sultan Ali Lakhani has been serving as the honorary consul of Mexico in Pakistan since long. He dabbled in politics too and remained a member of Senate, the upper house of Pakistan’s parliament, between 1988 and 1994 as a representative of a center-right party, Pakistan Muslim League. He once also famously pleaded guilty of committing bank fraud after he was arrested in 2000 by the National Accountability Bureau and kept in detention for nine months.
Employees
Missing Data
Contact
5 Expressway Off Korangi Road
Defence View, Karachi, Pakistan
Tel.: +92(0)-21-35800051
Fax: +92(0)-21-35800050
Email: smhumayun@cici.com.pk
Financial Information
Revenue (Financial Data/ Optional)
Missing Data
Operating Profit (in Mill. $)
Missing Data
Advertising (in % of total funding)
Missing Data
Management
Executive Board
Director and chief executive officer, he is the advisor to Lakson Group and has been serving as the honorary consul of Mexico in Pakistan since long. He remained a member of Senate, the upper house of Pakistan’s parliament, between 1988 and 1994. He also pleaded guilty of committing bank fraud after he was arrested in 2000 by the National Accountability Bureau and kept in detention for nine months.
director, Sultan Ali Lakhani’s son and runs the English language daily Express Tribune that also distributes to its Pakistani subscribers/buyers the international edition of the New York Times.
the chief operating officer of www.express.com.pk and the managing editor of daily Express. Apart from that, he is also serving as a director in several companies associated with Express Media Group.
Other Influential People
a nephew of Sultan Ali Lakhani and runs Cybernet, a part of Lakson Group of Companies, that provides Internet, cable television and phone services under the brand name Stormfiber. He is married to Nazafreen Saigol who is deputy chief executive at Dawn Media Group that owns daily Dawn and its website dawn.com as well as some other publications. She is also the Chief Operating Officer of Dawn News television and City FM 89 radio station.
Educated from the prestigious Yale School of Management in the United States, he started his professional career by running Express Tribune, an English language daily that Express Media Group brings out from Karachi, and its associated website www.tribune.com.pk. He is Sultan Ali Lakhani’s son.
graduated from Punjab University’s mass communication department in 1988 and started his journalism career in 1989 as a trainee sub-editor at Urdu language daily Nawa-i-Waqt in Lahore. Over the next decade, he became its news editor.
In 2002, he quit Nawa-i-Waqt and joined daily Express, also as news editor. Only a year later, he became the editor of the newspaper and was elevated to the post of group editor after Express Media Group launched other news platforms.
serves as a director in several of Express media and Lakson Group and companies. He is the Chief Operating Officer at Express Digital Private Limited and managing editor of Daily Express. He holds 33.33% shares in Express Digital Private Limited which operates the online outlets of the Express Media Group.
Further Information
Headlines
Meta Data
The company was sent information request on 15 January 2019 through a courier company as well as by email. It did not respond even after a reminder was couriered on 1st February 2019 and emailed on 4 February 2019. No verified online information is available about its ownership structure and its financial status.
Even the data obtained from SECP shows only its ownership structure and no record of its current or recent financial status.
