Takahashi was head of the privately owned EIE International Corp, which at one time owned one trillion yen in real estate assets. In 1986, EIE acquired a 35% stake in
Regent Hotels & Resorts. In 1989, Takahashi started building what was to become
The Regent New York on 57th Street, designed by
I. M. Pei. In a 1991
New York Times profile, he was compared to
Donald Trump, as a "brash" developer with a "hectic pace of property acquisitions", under pressure from banks and "struggling under $6 billion in shaky debt". At his peak, Takahashi owned Regent and Hyatt hotels across Asia, a floating hotel in Vietnam's
Ho Chi Minh City, 50% of Australia's
Bond University,
Denarau Island in Fiji, and was building a thousand-mile railway in Australia's. EIE sold Regent to
Four Seasons Hotels in 1992 and the New York hotel eventually opened as the
Four Seasons Hotel New York. ==Personal life==