Teo Seng Capital Berhad is one of Malaysia’s largest layer farmer and egg producer. All the farms are located in Johor. Egg production has reached 3.8 million eggs a day and is expected to increase to 4 million eggs by end 2020. About 40% of the eggs produced are exported mainly to Hong Kong and Singapore. It has captured almost 19% market share of the Singapore commercial egg production industry. For the financial year ended 31 December 2019 Teo Seng reported a revenue of RM547.1 million and pre-tax profit of RM41.29million. Going forward, Teo Seng will be focusing on promoting its premium Omega Lutein eggs to boost sales.

Teo Seng...

Singapore homegrown franchise, Korean inspired 4FINGERS CRISPY CHICKEN, opened its first outlet in Malaysia in Mid Valley Megamall in November 2015. It grew rapidly over the last 4 years to reach past 20 outlets! Four friends who enjoyed eating BonChon Chicken in New York City’s Koreatown decided to open 4FINGERS CRISPY CHICKEN in ION Orchard in November 2009. After 4 years the founders parted ways and sold their stake to a new investor. With fresh funds injected, 4FINGERS was able to go on an expansion trajectory. Its CEO, Steen Puggaard, a Dane who loved laksa and Singapore, was behind the successful growth of 4FINGERS. Puggaard had 20...

The Texas Chicken franchise in Malaysia was brought in by Dato’ Jaya JB Tan and his brother, Dato’ Kamal YP Tan, who are the Chairman and Group Chief Executive Officer of Singapore F&B listed company, Envictus International Holdings Ltd (formerly known as Etika International Holdings Ltd) respectively. Envictus International’s business divisions comprise Trading and Frozen Food, Food Services (Texas Chicken, San Francisco Coffee chain and The Delicious Group), Nutrition as well as Food Processing (Bakery and Butchery). Etika signed a 10 year agreement (2013-2022) with US-based Cajun Global LLC to develop and operate the Texas Chicken...

Anna Teo was an air stewardess but she had a business mind. It wasn’t easy being a woman with a business mind and a former air stewardness when she first ventured into the men’s trading world in 1996. She subsequently started to export whole durians reading the market right that there was a demand overseas for the Malaysia’s King of Fruits. She expanded downstream into unique durian products under Hernan Corporation Sdn Bhd. For example her Musang King durian mooncake became a bestseller in China and in countries where there is a huge Chinese population.

Anna Teo remembers the difficulties that she had to overcome to build up a RM40...

Food is what people will always need. With that in mind, Perak born Loi Tuan Ee stopped manufacturing carton boxes and bought land in Kota Tinggi, Johore to farm goats, grow dragon fruits and rear arowana fish. That was in the mid-2000s. By 2009 he was bottling goat’s milk to sell but producing enough of goat’s milk on a commercial scale was a big challenge and retailing it at a high price deterred customers. Loi did not believe in preservatives and so shelf life was also an issue (3 weeks). He decided for business sustainability to focus on rearing dairy cows.

But why fresh cow’s milk?...

In April 2019 the Lim family of Yee Lee Corporation (Yee Lee Corp) teamed up with a PE (Private Equity) Fund, Dymon Asia to take Yee Lee Corp private. The minority shareholders held out and the privatisation deal was not successful. It fell a little short of the 90% that the offerors needed in order to compulsorily acquire the balance of the 10% shares. While other shareholders cashed out at the general offer price of RM2.33 per share (net asset backing of Yee Lee Corp exceeds that and it has retained earnings of above RM500 million in its coffers) a remnant felt that they deserved more perhaps. The closing date was extended twice and the...

Malaysians will miss Tesco. After 18 years here, UK’s largest grocer, Tesco Plc, says goodbye.

The sale of Tesco’s Malaysian and Thai operations to Thai billionaire Dhanin Chearavanont’s CP Group for US$10.6 billion marks the conclusion of Tesco’s Asian operations. Tesco had exited from China in February 2020 after the sale of its stake to state-run partner, China Resources Holdings. In 2015 Tesco sold its S.Korean operations to MBK Partners, the biggest private equity fund in S. Korea. MBK is founded by Harvard University educated Michael Kim Byung-ju in 2005 according to Korea News Plus. The hedge fund paid US$6.1 billion for the...

In the mid-1990s Tan Sri Dato’ Sri Tang Yeam Soon and his wife, Puan Sri Khor Guik Lee started the Pacific Hypermarket Group, a nouveau business concept that embraced the hypermarket, supermarket and department store under one roof. “Jimat Setiap Hari” is its motto. In 2001 The Store Corporation (The Store) acquired the Pacific Hypermarket Group and Tan Sri Tang became its Group Managing Director.

The Store’s history goes back to the 1960s when it first opened in Bukit Mertajam, Penang. The idea was to offer good quality products at low prices in a no frills shopping environment. The company was listed in 1994. According to its...