After amassing a $15 billion fortune from casinos, Lui Che Woo wants to turn vice into virtue.

While Elon Musk is trying to get humans to Mars and Li Ka-shing joined Bill Gates to battle infant malnutrition, Lui, who rose from a rugged childhood in Japan-occupied Hong Kong, has stepped into the shoes of Alfred Nobel.

The gambling tycoon’s version of giving back involves awarding prizes that include a dinner-plate-sized trophy depicting Lui in his signature flat cap, together with a cash payout of HK$20 million ($2.56 million) -- double the amount of a Nobel Prize.

Winners also get a dinner-plate-sized trophy showing the “amiable and kind smiling face of Dr. Lui,” according to an effusive description on the prize’s website, “as if sowing a seed of benevolence in the world.”

The benevolence extends to three categories: sustainability, welfare development and positive energy, to be chosen via a three-tier structure that involves a recommendation committee, selection panels and the prize council. The latter consists of “five international personages,” including Lui, former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, a former Archbishop of Canterbury and the former Chief Executive of Hong Kong.

“Positive energy represents people trying to understand and help each other,” Lui said in an interview at his office in Hong Kong’s North Point, surrounded by his antique Chinese pottery collection.

This year’s winners, who will be honored at a ceremony on Oct. 3, are renewable energy advocate Hans-Josef Fell, a former parliament member for Germany’s Green Party; the World Meteorological Organization; and India’s Pratham Education Foundation.

Nobel Alternative
Lui’s prize, now in its third year, has gained attention as the Nobel committee comes under scrutiny for a #metoo moment, after a scandal at the Swedish Academy prompted the committee to defer awarding the literary prize this year. The Nobel committee said the current prize fund is 9 million Swedish kronor ($1 million). Lui says he isn’t trying to replace the 123-year-old awards but to offer an alternative.

It’s not the first alternative originating in China. After the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to jailed Chinese dissident author Liu Xiaobo, Beijing reacted furiously, breaking diplomatic ties with Norway and embarking on a six-year freeze that sent Norwegian salmon exports to China plunging. The writer withered away in captivity before his death in 2017.

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