As family businesses implement more sophisticated governance, the founding family often develops explicit rules in the form of a family constitution. This case explores one aspect of the family constitution, namely the ownership and control of the business in the second and third generation. An Asian patriarch, Ongky Lim, grapples with how to best preserve his legacy for future generations as he weighs advice from different people. The case helps family owners to evaluate different ownership and control options.

In September 2018, WaterEquity, a US-based investment vehicle for both financial and social returns, had to raise US$50 million in total funding capital. The sales team had to propose sales pitches for alternative investments for three types of investors. From a financial perspective, the investment was essentially a risk-free asset with an annual return of 3.5 per cent. However, this investment could also positively affect four developing countries—India, the Philippines, Indonesia, and Cambodia—by providing clean water solutions for billions of people. Through the lending facilities of the local microfinance institutions of these four countries, WaterEquity could offer support to the poor and empower more women, generating both financial and social returns. Different groups of investors might be attracted by different levels of these social returns as well as the financial returns. The sales team planned to use a simple extension of the standard Markowitz portfolio theory framework to incorporate social returns and account for two distinct types of returns, customizing the sales pitches for each of three groups of investors.

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In early 2015, the chief executive officer of Bumbox Logistics Private Limited (Bumbox) faced a challenge. The company, launched in Singapore, provided smart lockers for use by delivery companies and consumers to ensure the safe and timely receipt of online purchases. The lockers offered an attractive opportunity, given their ability to resolve last-mile delivery problems that plagued both logistics companies and online consumers. Despite the promising business concept, 18 months after launching, the business had not gained much traction—or revenue. The chief executive officer was fully aware of the company’s multiple challenges: because parcel lockers were a new concept in Singapore, consumers needed to be educated on their use; the company faced competition from other companies, including the nation’s post office; and while increasing the number of smart lockers would help the company succeed, expanding the network could only be justified once the lockers were being widely used. The company had tried to target three segments—online shoppers/consumers, logistics companies, and e-tailers—but because of limited resources, it needed to focus on one segment only. What strategy should the chief executive officer follow to take Bumbox to the next level?

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In mid 2019, Mobiuspace, a Chinese Internet company, faced a new challenge. As a result of declining revenues from domestic mobile Internet markets, overseas markets offered new opportunities. In 2009, Snaptube, a short video aggregation and distribution platform that Mobiuspace offered as its main product, seized the opportunity to grow in emerging markets by creating localized and personalized video content. Despite the company’s initial success with its expansion strategy, Mobiuspace’s chief executive officer still needed to figure out how to achieve sustainable profitability and long term growth. In particular, he had to enhance users’ engagement and diversify the company’s sources of revenue. How would he achieve all of his objectives?

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In 2016, China witnessed a significant rise in the knowledge economy. Many users, who had been used to consuming information on the Internet for free, had become increasingly willing to pay for user-generated-content (UGC). Recognizing this emerging opportunity, Qiushibaike (QB), a well-established UGC platform with a focus on entertaining content, rolled out a new pay-for-knowledge product, namely Youliaodao (YLD), which focused on informational content. Instead of following the popular pay-for-knowledge product endorsed by eye-catching celebrities for hedonic needs, YLD differentiated itself by charging for high-quality UGC for practical problem-solving. QB needed to make a critical decision: Should the company support YLD with additional investments and promotion of its informational content, or should QB terminate YLD and return to the company’s core competence area of promoting more entertaining content? How could YLD cope with the increased competition and overcome these obstacles?

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In August 2018, Excelco Equipment Pte. Ltd. (Excelco), based in Singapore, was facing challenges in recruiting talented young workers. The company’s senior staff would retire soon, and the majority of its workers were above the age of 40. Excelco had enjoyed a stable workforce flow for several decades, but now its employees were aging, and it needed to attract young workers. Excelco’s executive director was proud of the company’s family culture and attractive work environment, but prospective young workers seemed to have different wish lists for their dream jobs. Based on the feedback he received from young talent on what Excelco had to offer, he needed to make some important decisions on issues including how to improve the company’s current recruitment process and how to raise its employer brand awareness. Excelco’s resource constraints, as a small company in a traditional industry, meant that tackling its employment challenges would not be easy. The executive director needed to address several issues, including countering the poor image of construction jobs, promoting Excelco’s unique selling points, and finding the right recruitment channels. Ultimately, he had to recruit the right young talent into the right positions. Could he do it?

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In late 2018, the chief executive officer and founder of Tunaiku, a new digital consumer-lending financial technology (fintech) company in Indonesia, faced a dilemma. Although he had set out in 2014 to revolutionize Indonesia’s consumer lending by providing people in the underserved lower segment of society with small unsecured loans, he now faced his most crucial challenge—dealing with Indonesia’s changing regulatory environment. When he had launched the venture in 2014, fintech was unknown, and the founder had eventually decided to offer the product through a bank. But after Indonesia introduced a new fintech regulation, he needed to reconsider his earlier decision. Should Tunaiku move to a fintech licence or remain as a bank?

Ronds Science & Technology Incorporated Company (Ronds) was a leading smart solutions provider in China’s machine condition monitoring market. Since its establishment, 10 years earlier, the high-tech company’s monitoring and diagnostic solutions have been implemented across various industries, with the strongest foothold in the wind energy industry. However, the co-founder and chairman of Ronds observed that most Chinese industrial enterprises were slow in adopting technology in the area of maintenance and repair, and long sales cycles had led to Ronds missing its 2016 sales target. News of the Chinese central government’s plans to redistribute wind energy projects across China to new provinces also followed. Given Ronds’s weak profitability performance and the recent change in government policies, the company had to consider whether it should focus on further penetrating the wind energy market or expand to other industries. As either approach had its own challenges, the cofounder and his senior management looked to identify the best growth strategy for Ronds to remain competitive in the industry 4.0 era.

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Supplement for product 9B20A012

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By late 2018, a Singapore-based non-profit organization, billionBricks, had completed seven projects, rehabilitating more than a thousand homeless and disaster-stricken people in Asia. Its tent product was widely accepted and could, it was projected, meet the needs of millions of homeless people. Despite these achievements, the co-founder and chief executive officer felt that the company’s performance had not met his expectations. A key challenge was communicating with those who needed homes: the company’s traditional methods of communication were ineffective in reaching out to a marginalized population challenged by illiteracy and access to information. However, the prime minister of India had just announced his ambitious plan to end India’s homelessness and sought entrepreneurs for idea generation and execution. Should billionBricks participate in the government housing project to grow its Indian customer base, even if doing so included the risk of potential failure? Or should the company focus instead on other projects and risk being locked out of future housing projects in India?

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