Taseer A. Badar is an American entrepreneur, businessman and philanthropist. Badar is chairman and chief executive officer[1] of ZT Corporate, Inc., as well as many other Altus Health and ZT Corporate entities.
Badar's companies earned twelve non-consecutive Texas A&M "Aggie 100" awards between 2007 and 2022,[2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22] Houston Business Journal's 40 Under 40 (2012),[23] Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award winner (2016),[24] and The South Asian Chamber of Commerce (SACC) Businessperson of the Year Award (2018).[25]
Early life and education
The youngest of four siblings, Taseer Badar was born October 1, 1973, in
Lahore, Pakistan, where he spent the first 10 months of his life before immigrating to
Eau Claire, Wisconsin. His mother, Kausar, was a Nuclear Medicine Technologist Professor in Chemistry at VA Medical Center in her native home in Pakistan, and his father, Tanwir, was a Professional Engineer (PE) and Associate Professor at
King’s College London in Strand, London.[26]
In 1996, Badar began his
financial advisor career with
Morgan Stanley Dean Witter & Co. in New York City, where he built strong relationships with his clients. During his time here, he quickly realized that he "didn't want CNBC to dictate [his] life,"[27] so he returned to Houston and began a retail brokerage firm and began working with physicians who needed help investing their money.
Badar took this opportunity after receiving advice from his sister, Dr. Tehmina Badar, a
pulmonologist; brother-in-law Dr. Shahin Shirzadi, a
neurologist; and his best friend Dr. Raza Pasha, an ENT surgeon.[28] Thus began Altus Health.
In 2014, as CEO of Altus Health, Badar opened Altus House, the first in-patient
hospice unit in
Sugar Land, TX.[29]
In 2014, sensing an opportunity to expand outside of healthcare, Badar ventured into Florida and purchased several dealerships, including for Mercedes, BMW, Toyota, Kia, and Mazda vehicles.[30] This collection would soon become ZT Motors.
In 2020, Badar began a partnership with Swapnil Agarwal of Nitya Capital.[31]