An IPO, Sale, Even Adoption Are Options For Family Business Owners Without Heirs

Maybe the kids aren’t interested, or the parent doesn’t want them to lead the family empire. Whatever the reason, there are times when a family needs an exit from the business they have built.Family business expert Ng Siew Quan told CNBC that about a third of Asian family business owners were considering selling the company because they could not find a successor or felt that a sale was a better solution than handing the businesses to their children. The number of families in Asia looking to sell was higher that the average of family businesses polled globally – which came in at about 20 percent – in the 2014 survey, most likely due to shorter corporate lineages in Asia, Ng added.