Solomon Lew

Solomon Lew (born 22 March 1945) is an Australian businessman.

His principal commercial activities involve importing apparel, toys and other goods into Australia from China and investments, mainly in retail companies.

As a teenager, Lew supplied dresses to the Myer Emporium in Melbourne using his company Voyager Solo.

In 1981, Lew's family office Parfit Investments Pty Ltd made a takeover bid for John Martin & Co., an Adelaide-based department store chain.

The following year, another of Lew's firms Specular Investments Pty Ltd made an unsuccessful bid for eyewear retailer OPSM.

By 1983 Lew and controlled entities had obtained close to a 10 percent stake in Myer Emporium Ltd. In the same year he proposed a A$50 million takeover bid for the Australian branch of Cadbury Schweppes.

While Chairman of Coles Myer, Lew involved Coles Myer in a deal with a private company Yannon Pty Ltd which ultimately lost Coles Myer A$18 million.

An internal Coles investigation endorsed Lew's claim that he knew nothing of the deal, and a subsequent four-year investigation by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) ended with no charges being pursued.

Alan Cameron, ASIC chairman at the time, acknowledged during the press conference to announce the outcome of the investigation that: "It is worth saying that the original loss suffered by Coles Myer was about A$18 million, and the recovery made by Coles Myer was in excess of A$12 million."

The trust was used to acquire 2% of Coles Myer in 1989, at a time of high interest rates.

Lew offered competing explanations for what happened next.

But the end result was that the Coles Myer shares were assigned to Premier Investments for an A$8 million profit.

A Queen's Counsel who investigated the transaction said:

Lew and Lindsay Fox formed a consortium to acquire Ansett Airlines after it had an Administrator appointed.

They sought and obtained the exclusive right to negotiate to purchase the airline.

They obtained the agreement of various stakeholders in the airline, including trade union members and their representatives.

Greg Combet, the secretary of the ACTU said Lew had breached 'repeated commitments'.

During this time spent negotiating, the administrators had been persuaded to continue to operate the airline despite heavy losses which reduced the amount ultimately available to creditors, which included employees owed entitlements.

Lew contributed to this 1996 settlement with Coles-Myer.

Cameron also said that it was "clearly true" that Lew was not guilty of any breaches of the law.

When asked if he believed Lew was innocent, Cameron replied: "of course."

ABC Radio's PM program described the transaction:

When Coles Myer's chief financial officer, Philip Bowman, resigned and revealed the details of the transaction it brought a great deal of unwanted public attention to Lew.

Bowman's revelations prompted an investigation into whether the Yannon transaction broke the Corporations Law or other laws that lasted five years and gathered a quarter of a million pages of documents and twelve thousand pages of evidence.

The ASIC recommended criminal prosecution against Lew in its brief, although the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions, who had the final decision, decided not to proceed with criminal charges against Lew, Lew's advisers, or those working within Coles Myer.

The Chairman of ASIC told the ABC:

Another controversial business transaction involving Lew related to a single purpose trust called Etiket.

The beneficiaries were Lew's family.

He was also involved in an attempt to resurrect Ansett airlines with Lindsay Fox following its collapse in September 2001.

In 2008 he returned to the board of his public company, Premier Investments, and became its chairman.

In 2014 Lew built a ten per cent stake in David Jones Limited after South African retailer Woolworths launched a takeover bid for the department store.

Lew was formerly a director then chairman of Coles Myer (now known as the Coles Group) until voted out by shareholders.

In 2016 he became the first Australian to be inducted into the World Retail Hall of Fame, which recognises the lifetime achievements of retail "legends".

In 2023, the Financial Review assessed Lew's net worth as A$3.97 billion; Forbes assessed his net worth as US$1.46 billion in 2019; and Lew was ranked 33rd on The Australian's Richest 250 List.

Lew was born in Melbourne to Esther (Windman) and Pinkus Lew (originally Lewkowicz), Polish Jews from Częstochowa who immigrated to Australia during the Interwar period.

His father was active in Melbourne's Jewish community and was vice-president of a landsmanshaft for Częstochowa Jews.

He established a textiles business in Flinders Lane, but died when his son was 12 years old.

Lew was educated at Mount Scopus Memorial College.

He established his first business, Voyager Solo, at the age of 18.

He studied accounting and commerce at night school.