Abstract

Happiness Capital is a global venture capital firm within the hundred-year-old Lee Kum Kee Group with a mission to bring happiness to the community and the world through venture investments. As the founding Lee family progressed into the fifth generation, it wanted to diversify into a business that would also benefit the society, and impact investing emerged as an answer as it was a cause that resonated across different generations of the family. Happiness Capital undertook the pioneering initiative to co-create the “Happiness Return Framework” together with industry experts, addressing the issue of impact measurements often encountered in impact investing. The case examines how Happiness Capital defines and measures happiness with its proprietary “Happiness Return Framework,” as well as examining its investment strategies, process, performance, risk management, organization and governance.

Learning Objectives

After analyzing this case, students are expected to be able to:

1. Understand the Lee family’s rationales for creating Happiness Capital and the objectives it sought to achieve with the venture.
2. Understand how family offices could undertake impact investing and the best practices of successful impact investing by a family office.
3. Understand how happiness could be defined and measured to assess the outcome of impact investing.
4. Understand how organization, governance and management structure could be optimized to facilitate successful impact investing.