Dato Ch'ng Huck Theng

Ch’ng Huck Theng never wanted to run Ghee Hiang. The fourth-generation heir to Malaysia’s oldest confectionery had built a different life entirely—media entrepreneur, magazine publisher, serious painter. After completing Commerce and Management degrees at Australia’s University of Wollongong, he returned to Penang to found CHT Network Sdn Bhd and launch lifestyle magazines including FREZH and EZ Malaysia. His fine art practice wasn’t a hobby; it would eventually earn him the Asia Art Award (2010) and placement in institutions from Shanghai Art Museum to Paris’s École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts.

Without the history, the culture and the heritage, then it will be a state without a soul.

Then his family tore itself apart over a 143-year-old pastry business.

The crisis that forced Ch’ng into Ghee Hiang in 1999 wasn’t a market disruption or competitive threat—it was generational warfare between the four families that had owned the business since 1926. His own reflection captures the internal dynamics: “It was between my grandfather and father. It mainly started with disagreements on strategy and one thing led to another. They were just at odds with each other.”

An extraordinary general meeting resulted in forced removal of directors—granduncles and uncles from the other families. They sued. The litigation consumed approximately seven years. Ch’ng found himself pulled into a business he had explicitly avoided, defending family interests in courtrooms while watching a heritage brand deteriorate under operational paralysis.

His partner Datuk Ooi Sian Hian—an architect by profession who also never planned for a confectionery career—offered the starkest assessment of the period: “We did not face many problems during economic downturns. Our biggest setback came in the form of trouble between the families… it was one of toughest challenges the family business had to deal with as the feud nearly spelt its doom.”

The “Am I delusional?” moment for Ch’ng wasn’t about market viability or business strategy. It was about identity. He had constructed a professional life around creativity, international perspective, and entrepreneurial independence. The family crisis demanded he become something different: a heritage businessman managing a declining confectionery where the previous generation’s mechanization experiments had ruined product quality and customer service had deteriorated to notorious hostility.

What saved both Ch’ng and Ghee Hiang was the recognition that his outsider perspective wasn’t a liability—it was precisely what the business needed. The same international education that had seemed irrelevant to selling tau sar pneah provided distance from the family assumptions that created the crisis. The artistic sensibility that appeared incompatible with commercial operations enabled him to see the brand as cultural patrimony requiring stewardship rather than merely a revenue-generating asset requiring management.

Ch’ng articulates the philosophy that emerged from this transformation: “Some things have to evolve and some things have to stay. While we have to evolve to survive, we also need to preserve and promote what we are known for. We must not change totally everything; there must be something that our forefathers had done right that gave us an opportunity to grow further.”

This evolution-without-erasure principle guided the turnaround. Production returned to handmade methods—abandoning the machinery that had compromised quality. But the business embraced selective modernization: e-commerce platforms, delivery services, contemporary product extensions. Most critically, Ch’ng recognized that Ghee Hiang Baby Brand Pure Sesame Oil—introduced in the early 1900s but overlooked in pastry-focused narratives—could provide the revenue stability that tourism-dependent pastry sales never would.

Sesame oil now generates 70% of Ghee Hiang’s revenue. The diversification strategy proved its value during COVID-19, when George Town’s tourism collapsed entirely but sesame oil exports to 400+ Hong Kong supermarkets continued. The reluctant heir’s outside perspective had identified an asset that family insiders, fixated on the pastries that defined the brand’s identity, had undervalued for decades.

Ch’ng’s concurrent leadership roles extend the heritage stewardship philosophy beyond Ghee Hiang. As Chairman of the Association of Tourism Attractions Penang (ATAP) and President of the Penang Art Society, he positions the confectionery’s survival within broader cultural preservation: “If the government does not take the initiative to do something with the heritage, the culture, and the arts scene, no one is going to bother… We feel that it is also part of our responsibility to make Penang a better place by preserving the culture, preserving the heritage and engaging with the new generation because they will be the next custodian.”

The Beach Street location—which survived Japanese bombing during World War II—has been restored to late 19th/early 20th century aesthetic with viewing decks and museum elements. In January 2023, Chief Minister Chow Kon Yeow officially unveiled the renovated heritage boutique. The artist-entrepreneur who never wanted to run a confectionery had transformed family obligation into civic mission.

For Ch’ng, the personal crisis of reluctant succession resolved into clarity that took years to achieve. The skills he had developed outside the family business—international perspective, artistic sensibility, entrepreneurial instinct—became the competitive advantages that insiders couldn’t replicate. The seven years of litigation that seemed like wasted time provided lessons in resilience, negotiation, and governance that no business school could teach. The identity crisis of becoming something he hadn’t chosen resolved when he recognized that heritage stewardship merged commercial discipline with cultural responsibility.

The lesson isn’t that outside experience automatically qualifies reluctant heirs for leadership. It’s that the distance from family assumptions—often perceived as disqualification—can provide precisely the perspective needed to see beyond the dynamics that created the crisis. Ch’ng’s artistic training helped him understand Ghee Hiang as cultural artifact, not merely commercial operation. His international education helped him see export potential in sesame oil that family members focused on pastry traditions had overlooked. His entrepreneurial experience helped him recognize when evolution was necessary and when preservation was essential.

Today, the fourth-generation heir who never planned to join the family business has positioned Ghee Hiang for continued growth: new factory at Penang Science Park North operational in 2024, halal product development expanding addressable markets, heritage tourism strategy elevating brand positioning. The obligation he initially resisted became the work that integrated his disparate identities—artist, entrepreneur, heritage steward—into coherent purpose.

“Without the history, the culture and the heritage,” Ch’ng observes, “then it will be a state without a soul. You can build a nice and big building with good infrastructure, but you just have a nice body; you don’t have a soul.”

The reluctant heir discovered that preserving souls is what he was built for all along.

Last updated: January 15, 2026