Vietnamese Restaurant Chain Attracts Foreign Funds

  To meet the demand of growing of young consumer, the food and beverage services in Vietnam have been attracting investment in setting up business, M&A activity.

The Vietnam business community recently is not out of surprise when a series of Vietnamese restaurant chains are invested by famous overseas funds with millions of USD.

The start-up project with the restaurant chain named “Kafe Group” by Chi Anh Dao, a female chef and businesswoman born in 1984 has just got the attention by receiving an investment amount of 5.5 million USD (over 120 billion VND) from Cassia Investments - an investment fund from Hong Kong (China).

Previously at the end of 2014, the chain of 100 restaurants named “Mon Hue” (Hue Dishes) of Huy Vietnam Food Processing Co., Ltd has been invested by Franklin Templeton fund, a fund managed by billionaire Mark Mobius with 11 million USD investment capitals.

According to the owner of “Mon Hue” restaurant, this food chain also receives investment capital from 4 other investors from Singapore, Hong Kong (China)... Currently, this chain includes 3 brands: Mon Hue, Rice Express and Mr. Hung Noodles.

Before KAfe Group and Huy Vietnam, Golden Gate – including such brands as Kichi Kichi, Sumo BBQ, Ashima, Vuvuzela... received the investment flow with 2.6 million USD from Mekong Capital Fund in 2009. Next, Standard Chartered Private Equity Fund from Standard Chartered Bank has spent 35 million USD to repurchase these shares.

Besides buying shares of Vietnam companies, the culinary market has continuously welcome many foreign brands opening restaurant in Vietnam such as Tokyo Deli, Coca Suki, Sakura, Oshima...

According to experts, investing in culinary market is the trend of modern business model. In particular, food chains seem to be less affected by the economic downturn as they meet the indispensable needs of life. Therefore, this food and beverage service sector in Vietnam is always attractive to funds.

Finding the right business partner in Vietnam is also important. We recommend doing research on the reputation of the company and individual shareholders, corporate or individual, gathering publicly available company information, and performing background checks on key personnel to find potential risks in cooperation. Working with a reliable partner can help achieve economic benefits, saving time and money in business.