Forbes Asia - October 2018

(Steven Felgate) #1
26 | FORBES ASIA OCTOBER 2018

A


fter Vincent Lin, an
early supersalesman
for Taiwan’s TCI, was
made its CEO in 2010,
he decided to take
the maker of private-label dietary
supplements up a considerable
notch. He would invest in what
he called “integrated bioscience
design” (IBD) to come up with pro-
prietary ingredients to differentiate
itself across a product line address-
ing everything from sleep promo-
tion and weight loss to countering
depression and skin aging.
TCI would unlock and extract
new substances—such as from
agricultural wastes like longan
shell and banana peel—through its
laboratory work. That IBD is being
carried out by Ph.D.s among a team
of 200 researchers employing biol-
ogy, agronomics, industrial engi-
neering and consumer behavior
studies to attract premium-brand
clients. Since 2013, the effort has
expanded into genomics in one

of the nine labs, with the promise
of tailoring personalized needs to
nutricyclicals.
That last efort is a $6.5 million
multiyear push on top of what is
now an annual $6 million R&D
budget. Lin’s gamble is that this will
keep the 500 corporate customers
in 48 countries wanting to put their
labels on TCI wares without much
haggle room over price. That’s the

basis for a repeat 2018 appearance
for his outfit on Forbes Asia’s Best
Under A Billion companies list—and
the genomics could lead to TCI’s
own retail lines as well.
The company’s trove of novel
formulas underlies its 41% gross
margin, says Donald Lee, an analyst
with JihSun Securities in Taipei.
“Its strength lies in its fast-paced
development of key ingredients, its
capability of manufacturing a com-
prehensive array of dosage forms
and its perfect timing of product
launch, just to name a few,” he says.
Lin, 42, has led the push and as
of mid-2017 took over as chairman
as well from William Yang, who
founded TCI in 1980 as a trading
company in textiles and assorted
other goods. (TCI originally was
Tai Chiang—or “big river”—In-
dustrial.) An ironsmith’s son who
majored in plant pathology and
once sold orchid seedlings, Lin was
a dynamo from the start for Yang’s
foray into preventative potions,

Big Swallow


Founder’s protégé has brought “bioscience design”
to a nutricyclicals maker in Taiwan.

BY JOYCE HUANG

BEST UNDER A BILLION — TCI


FORBES ASIA

William Yang founded TCI in 1980 as a trading
company dealing textiles and other goods.
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