Established in 2013, Shin Nihon Jusetsu Group (“SNJ”) is a leading company in the residential solar panel and battery storage business. SNJ sells, installs and maintains comprehensive residential solar and battery product solutions, including solar power generation systems and storage battery systems for residential use, as well as “smart house” facilities and accompanying housing renovation products and services. SNJ has expanded its own sales and installation networks nationwide in Japan and has a leading market share in solar power generation systems and storage battery systems.

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Founder succession. Longreach acquired a majority stake in SNJ in May 2024 from Mr. Akihide Kaneda, the founder and sole shareholder of SNJ, who will retain a significant minority stake in the business and will continue as its Chairman.

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• Accelerating new alliance partner development and strengthening of existing alliance partners in the B2B2C business
• Expanding geographic footprint by facilitating recruitment and talent development
• Pursuing cross-selling opportunities by expanding products and services
• Expanding business areas and product and service offerings through roll-up acquisitions
• Improving quality and efficiency of operations by consolidating back-office functions
• Strengthening the business and improving performance by hiring new management
• Improving ESG monitoring systems and public relations and marketing functions

The Company operates its main business under the brand name “Dr.stretch”, founded in 2010.  Dr.stretch offers one-on-one assisted stretch services at its own or franchisees’ outlet studios.  Dr.stretch is the pioneer and leader in the assisted stretch market in Japan, with dominant market share, and is the third largest stretch studio chain globally, with over 200 studios in Japan and globally including in Singapore, Taiwan, Malaysia, and the UAE, with further market entries underway.

Founder Succession, Unlocking Growth and Cross Cultural Solutions.  Longreach acquired a majority interest in nobitel inc. by buying shares from Mr. Masahiro Kurokawa, the founder and CEO, and from minority shareholders, combined with acapital injection in the form of convertible preferred shares.  The transaction was closed in August 2023.

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• Accelerating new stores openings funded by capital injection from Longreach, and reflecting significant growth potential and white space in Japan
• Improving operational efficiency through digitalization, optimized customer scheduling across opening hours, dynamic pricing and package personalization
• Strengthening of web based marketing by further investment in advertising to optimize customer acquisition cost
• Capturing significant expansion potential outside Japan (especially SE Asia markets) through Longreach’s global network
• Enhancing corporate governance, including new KPIs and performance aligned HR evaluation/compensation
• Developing new businesses including non retail platforms and B2B business

Established in 2004, Blueship is an IT service company specializing in SaaS/PaaS solutions. Clients include public organizations and private enterprises where Blueship delivers digital transformation(“DX”), including as a SaaS solution provider via the ServiceNow platform.

Founder Succession. Longreach acquired 100% of Blueship from the founder and other minor shareholders, negotiated through a control buyout in April 2023. The transaction was a bolt-on acquisition for Japan Systems, enabled by LCP3 follow-on capital.

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• Create scale and synergies by integrating with Japan Systems
• ~Enhancement of management structure and organizational functions
• ~Cross-selling Blueship solutions to Japan Systems' strong customer base
• ~Expand Japan Systems' solutions by leveraging Blueship's unique DX solutions capabilities
• ~Strengthen the employment pace and quality by combining the recruiting and training know-how of both companies
• Refine SaaS/PaaS solutions in this growth market and expand the number of engineers with relevant skills
• Enhance corporate governance and management performance, including via new KPIs and performance aligned HR evaluation/compensation

APC Group (ex-Amazon Papyrus) is a leading specialty chemical and process solutions provider to the pulp, paper, water treatment, viscose fiber and barrier function applications in Asia.  APC Group is headquartered in Hong Kong, with regional presence in over 14 countries in Asia, including Greater China, India, South-East Asia, Japan, and the Middle East, and with production facilities in Thailand, India and China.

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Founder Succession. Longreach acquired a majority stake in APC Group in June 2021 from Navis Capital Partners, founders and management, with the founders and management retaining a significant minority stake.

• Execute value creating founder succession in full alignment with founders to fully institutionalize capabilities and the corporate platform, including through implementation of new MIS, new KPIs, hiring of Chief Strategy Officer and building out the management team
• Significant market and new account growth opportunities in China, SE Asia and India
• Japan market entry opportunity
• Strategic geographic expansion of production facilities
• Leverage expertise in paper process chemicals to expand into high potential adjacent sub-verticals such as water treatment

Established in 1965, Chat Noir Company (“Chat Noir”) is one of the leading coffee shop chains in Japan. Chat Noir is a well-known and positioned brand, operating more than 190 stores (at the acquisition) across Japan mainly under the brand “Caffè Veloce”, a self-service style café. Integrating with Kohikan, Chat Noir became C-United in April 2021.

Founder Succession. Longreach acquired 100% of Chat Noir from the founder family, negotiated through a control buyout in February 2020.

• Appointment of new CEO and CFO with deep industry expertise and management bench strengthening
• Transformation into larger scale café chain through integration with Kohikan – to create synergies such as better access to store location sourcing, strengthened purchasing power, efficient logistics, enhanced marketing and product development capabilities, effective and efficient HQ, etc.
• Renovations of existing captive stores funded by capital injected by Longreach
• Renewal of menu, pricing, and marketing activities adjusting to latest consumer needs
• Refinement of service quality through restructuried training program, hiring and retention plan, and stronger sales support from HQ
• Improvement of customer experience and operations efficiency through digital investment
• Enhancement of corporate governance, including new KPIs and performance aligned HR evaluation/compensation

Quasar Engineering (“Quasar”) is a contract development and manufacturing organization (“CDMO”) for the medical device industry, servicing leading global OEMs such as Johnson & Johnson and Medtronic, specializing in the assembly of complex minimally invasive components and devices across therapeutic areas, with focus on the cardiology space. Quasar is headquartered in Hong Kong, with assembly facilities in China, Thailand, and Singapore and R&D resources in Israel.

Founder Succession. Longreach acquired a majority stake in Quasar in 2019 from the founding family, with the founders retaining a significant minority stake.

• Control buyout based in Hong Kong with Japan market entry opportunity
• Strong organic growth driven by MedTech industry’s underlying outsourcing trend and regional market opportunities
• Leverage high technical capability and culture of quality to pursue growth strategy towards high-precision, high value medical device sub-verticals
• Diversification of business portfolio to acquire new large key clients
• Management corporate governance and culture change: shift from family-owned business to institutionalized platform, including implementing new CEO and senior executive hirings, new MIS and KPIs

Founded in September 1998, Cybird is a pioneer mobile content provider which successfully expanded into developing and delivering popular mobile game contents, mainly targeting a female user base, along with expansion via its commerce businesses into cosmetics and health food products.

Founder Succession and Going Private & Management Partnership. Going private through tender offer ("TOB") process and management partnership with the founder CEO. Longreach owned 91.9% while the founder CEO owned 8.1%.

• Founder and management had a proven track record. Longreach’s ownership and capital structure provided management with new flexibility to take greater advantage of unfolding strategic growth opportunities
• Opportunity to transform Cybird’s established business into a long term growth business by creating a new mobile advertisement business model as a platform business
• Stable cash flow from the existing mobile content and catalogue order business based on a high existing market share
• Cost competitive business structure and operations, achieved through implementation of cost efficiencies and tighter alignment of execution resources with strategic growth plan
• Improved financial management, budgeting and reporting systems implemented by new CFO recruited by Longreach

Founded as a joint venture between McDonald’s Corporation and Den Fujita in 1971.  Japan’s largest fast food restaurant chain with JPY 395 bn of revenues and over 3,700 stores, publicly listed at c. JPY 300bn market cap in July 2005, when business restructuring was in process under the new CEO to improve low growth and margins.  Then owned by the McDonald’s Corporation (49.99%), Fujita family (26.91%) and public shareholders (23.10%).

Founder Succession and Cross Cultural Solutions. Fujita family seeking exit but their shares represented 18 months trading volume - highly illiquid stock with high valuation. McDonald’s Corporation wished to facilitate the Fujita exit while keeping the McDonald’s Japan turnaround focus on track. Control buyout impossible given McDonald’s strategic shareholding requirement, and vanilla equity investment impossible given high valuation and lack of liquidity. Through exclusive negotiations with McDonald’s and the Fujita family, Longreach developed a unique structured minority investment approach that solved for the deal constraints and generated high returns, enabling the investment in July 2005.

• Longreach devised embedded exit structure to allow for minority investment

• ~Fully financed and hedged share acquisition through mandatory exchangeable note placement with entry price into the stock at deep discount to market price
• ~Combined up-front distribution and further distributions realized through profit share structure, reflecting strong turnaround of the McDonald’s Japan business

• All parties achieved objectives

• ~Fujita family realized complete exit with full liquidity
• ~McDonald’s achieved stable shareholding transition to support business turnaround
• ~Longreach secured outstanding investment return and built valuable relationships