The youngest of three siblings, Tanoesoedibjo was born to a local businessman in East Java. Like several members of his family, he went to university in Canada, specifically, Carleton University where he achieved a bachelor’s degree in Commerce, before moving to the University of Ottawa to get his MBA.

In the November of 1989, just a few months after he had graduated and subsequently moved back to Indonesia, he founded PT. MNC Investama, (later to become PT Bhakti Investama Tbk) focussing mainly on capital-market activities, something the government was very much encouraging and helping with at the time. Up until 1997 when it was floated on the Jakarta Stock Exchange, the company expanded its activities to include mergers and acquisitions, financial advisory services and securities trading and brokerage.

Since the turn of the century, as well as remaining on as president of PT Bhakti Investama Tbk, he turned his focus onto the media, becoming president of PT Global Mediacom Tbk, PT MNC Sky Vision Tbk since 2006, and RCTI. He became very much interested in politics, and largely inspired by Donald Trump, formed his own party Partai Perindo (Indonesian Unity Party) in 2015.

Tanoesoedibjo still owns 60 TV stations, several radio ones and a newspaper, and his real estate business MNC Land.