When she assumed the post of chief financial officer at RSH Limited in December 2008, Lelaina Lim expected it to be a pretty straight forward job. Having successfully navigated China’s complex financial regulatory framework for the past six years prior to RSH, Lim pictured it to be her “retirement job”. “RSH needed a CFO to help head their entire international operations, and the company saw that I had the skills to do this,” Lim tells The Asset in an interview.

Little did she realize that the global financial crisis that started in the US would have a profound impact on the company, marking the beginning of an extensive restructuring process. The issues began to emerge when RSH’s 61% shareholder Emaar MGF, a joint venture between Emaar Properties and MGF Developments, wasn’t able to list on the Indian market. As a result, Emaar MGF couldn’t pay off its debt to the bank so it defaulted, prompting the trading suspension of RSH shares.

It was a shock for Lim, who at the time was spending Good Friday with her children. As a temporary solution, Emaar stepped into the shoes of MGF and guaranteed the initially defaulted loan to the bank. However, both parties were still thinking about selling their stakes in RSH despite the worsening market conditions and eventually put the block of shares to the market for bidding. “I think around 11 companies came to me for due diligence,” Lim recalls. “For six months, I was dealing with companies from all over the world, including private equity.”

Eventually, there was only one suitable bidder but it had to be approved first by Inditex, the owner of the popular Zara brand for which RSH held the franchise licence. It appeared to be a done deal but unfortunately, the bidder was not approved. Going back to the drawing board, Lim along with senior management decided that stability of the company’s current management was key so they opted for a management buyout (MBO) with the original stakeholder Emaar. “The best solution in times of crisis is continuity,” she stresses.

With the support of Mohamed Ali Alabbar, the chairman of Emaar, Lim went out to the marketplace to find a bank that was willing to finance the MBO. At the same time, she had to buy up all the shares from the public domain. Emaar increased its stake in RSH from 30% to 61.3% and the company was eventually delisted from the Singapore stock exchange in October 2010. Lim had to take out several bank loans to support the MBO.
In the midst of all of these activities, Lim also had to deal with the day-to-day operations of the business, especially since the company was looking to further expand in the Middle East at the time. “We had 80,000 square feet of shopping space,” she explains. “We had so much exposure, and we had staff and leases to pay.”

Nevertheless, through the advice of the late CEO of RSH Vinord Kumar Gomber, Lim sought to focus on conserving cash and collecting. “He told me to hold less stock and collect from people who may go into trouble,” she says. “When the Dubai crisis hit we were able to fund our operations over there because of this strategy.”

Thanks to her scheme, RSH’s business operations were not impacted and actually did surprisingly well in some units. “My sports sales were going through the roof. I guess during a crisis people exercise more,” Lim joked.
Stability finally returned to RSH in 2012 when the Dubai-based conglomerate Al Futtaim entered into a joint venture with Emaar for control of the company. “We had to wait for seven months for Al Futtaim’s decision,” Lim recalls. “I thought that was the end of the deal but eventually it was a yes.”

Since the successful M&A, Lim has continued striving forward, using the restructuring opportunity to make improvements to the company by focusing on training, IT systems and transparency. It could be said that few CFOs have had to navigate corporate challenges as much as Lim did. Through her leadership RSH is now secure and positioned for future growth.

“I remember immediately after the M&A deal was signed in 2012, the weekend of Good Friday I was out shopping in Paris,” she recalls, happily.