The Ongoing Battle Between The Owners Of Tealive And Chatime Is Finally Over
Loob Holding and La Kaffa have agreed to settle their disputes amicably.
By Samantha Khor — 30 Aug 2018, 01:29 PM
After nearly two years of court battles and arbitration proceedings, the owners of Tealive and Chatime have finally reached a mutual agreement
In a joint statement released today, 30 August, Loob Holding Sdn Bhd (Tealive) and La Kaffa International Co Ltd (Chatime) announced that both companies have reached an out-of-court settlement to amicably resolve all disputes arising from their one-time franchise relationship of the Chatime bubble tea brand.
In light of the amicable resolution, both parties have agreed to withdraw all ongoing proceedings in Malaysian courts as well as arbitration in Singapore
In an interview with SAYS in February last year, Loob Holding CEO Bryan Loo revealed that the company initiated an arbitration case against La Kaffa in late 2016 after the Taiwanese company allegedly launched a new product in Malaysia without the then-master franchisee's knowledge.
Meanwhile, La Kaffa has sought to halt Tealive's operations since March 2017 after Loob Holding seemingly replaced all of their Chatime outlets with their own bubble tea brand following the termination of their master franchisee contract in January 2017.
Though the injunction was initially thrown out by the High Court of Kuala Lumpur in May 2017, the Court of Appeal overruled the dismissal in June this year. Despite that, business continued as usual for Tealive outlets in Malaysia.
The statement added that Loob Holding and La Kaffa have made the decision to "stop all court or any other enforcement actions against each other"
This means that the injunction case filed by La Kaffa is likely to have been dropped, allowing Tealive to continue operations in Malaysia without issue.
In the statement, both parties also clarified that the settlement does not mean that either of them admitted to the allegations and liabilities named in the court and arbitration
"This joint Press statement is part of the terms of settlement. Both parties have agreed that all the other terms shall remain private and confidential," the statement read.