MANCHESTER, Jamaica — Billionaire Michael Lee-Chin has lauded the vision of businessman Garfield Virgin in the transformation of the former Mandeville Hotel, four acres of prime real estate in the heart of this south-central town. It is now the Garden Hotel.

“This place, someone had to have a vision to take it from [what] it was before. Someone had to believe in the vision, and themselves, and that person had to be a high-energy person. When that person executed [it was done] with force and speed,” Lee-Chin told business leaders during a presentation at the property on Tuesday.

He added that his mother Hyacinth Chen had expressed an interest in purchasing the property, which neighbours the family’s plaza, in 2021.

“She wanted to buy it three months before she died. We drove in here and looked at the big trees and it is just a beautiful property… I am so happy because of what I saw today. It warms my heart, it shows what vision, grit, perseverance, entrepreneurism can do and anything we can do at NCB (National Commercial Bank) to support all of those things we are right here,” said Lee-Chin, who is also chairman of the NCB.

He promised his audience consisting of 14 business leaders to return to Mandeville annually for client engagement as part of NCB’s commitment to its business customers.

Businessman Michael Lee-Chin speaking with business leaders in Mandeville at the Garden Hotel on Tuesday. (Photo: Kasey Williams)

“I am from Mandeville and we want to make sure that you avoid pitfalls, you learn from us… I will come back once a year and we have a meeting like this,”’ he said.

Virgin, in highlighting the expansion of the Garden Hotel up from 31 rooms by year-end, told the Jamaica Observer of plans for further development on the property.

“I will be adding about another 50 rooms with 30 of them ready for December and then we will be having an independent facility system around the back,” he said.

He credited Lee-Chin’s presentation to the business leaders as an inspiration to excel in commerce and development.

“It has motivated me in more ways than one… If he [Lee-Chin] can be like this and accomplish this, the sky is the limit for me. As a businessman from Jamaica he has motivated me by giving me some life lessons that I can then take away and help to structure my business, so it can be a better version of itself,” said Virgin.

NCB Billionaire Michael Lee-Chin speaking with business leaders in Mandeville at the Garden Hotel on Tuesday. (Photo: Kasey Williams)

Lee-Chin also, in responding to questions regarding loans for businesses and challenges in timely assessments, suggested the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in making the process more efficient.

“We have to get back to what banking is, the pricing of risks. In the past that [was] not scalable, because you had to spend all the time assessing each person, so we have to find better ways to access precisely. And guess what? Thank God for AI, because that is what AI will do, [it] will allow us to scale precision assessment,” he said.

“AI will allow us to scale precision assessment, because it is all algorithms, it is now for us to make sure that we incorporate AI, so we can assess properly, precisely and price accordingly… We are a Jamaican bank and guess what? We don’t have to go to Canada. We don’t have to go to Trinidad. We don’t have to ask anybody outside of Jamaica if we can do it. We can do it right here,” he added.

Clive Wint, managing director at C&D Construction and Engineering Ltd, welcomed Lee-Chin’s pledge that NCB will increase its support to businesses in accessing loans more efficiently.

“Based on NCB being Jamaican-owned and what we have agreed on in terms of businesses to get more support by putting more money into our business, that commitment from NCB is going to see us doing more business with NCB. I have learnt so much from Mr Lee-Chin and it has encouraged me to go further and deeper into business and to take more risks,” he said.