"Save China's Tigers" was founded in 2000 by Li Quan, former fashion executive at Gucci, Benetton and Fila in Italy. When Li Quan realized the dire state of the South China tigers in the wild and saw the poor conditions in which captive South China tigers were living in China several years ago, she devoted herself to saving the tigers. She established the charitable foundation Save China's Tigers in the UK in 2000, and subsequently in the United States (2002) and Hong Kong (2003). She engineered the Chinese Tiger Conservation Model after observing and analysing how wildlife conservation and eco-tourism have succeeded in Africa.