When Andre Koo, Sr. joined Chailease, his father’s equipment-leasing outfit, in the 1990s, it held a 40 per cent share in Taiwan’s leasing market. It specialised in providing loans to small businesses that most banks avoided due to the high risk and low returns involved. After Koo restructured the company, profits increased phenomenally, and he continued its move into Southeast Asia, financing companies like the boutique aviation company PhilJets in the Philippines.

Chailnese now invests in energy generation and energy storage, with the largest number of solar power plants in Taiwan. The company has also ventured into electricity sales and partnered with industry stakeholders in pushing for zero carbon emissions.

Chailease includes China Rental Holdings, which oversees financial undertakings, and China Real Holdings, which deals in the field of hotel catering, and investments. Aside from China and Southeast Asia, the industrial category extends to consumer financial services operating in Europe and the United States.

In 2018, it added Aischi Catering and in 2022 entered fine dining and opened the French restaurant Sens in the same year. As part of its catering business group, the company launched JLK Sake Studio, with its first store next to the Taipei City Government Subway Station. Serving as the bridge between wine suppliers and consumers, it aims to provide the best selection of Japanese liquor straight from the source.

While pursuing food and catering, it simultaneously launched Join Home in 2021 as a response to the pandemic. With the goal of protecting its employees, Join Home partners with reputable healthcare factories in developing home protection and healthcare products.

Andre Koo comes from a prominent line of industrialists, with the first generation of Koos making their fortune from salt, sugar and opium, eventually expanding into manufacturing, real estate and financial services. His father, Jeffrey Koo Sr, is known for introducing the first credit card to Taiwan in 1944. All three Koos—Jeffrey, Andre and his son Andre Jr, are graduates of NYU Stern School of Business, which in 2018 started offering an immersive one-year master’s program named the Andre Koo Tech MBA.