Kenny Wee sued for HK$90m over Metro newspaper deal
Catering boss Kenny Wee Ho is being sued for HK$90 million by the companies from which he bought the free Metro Daily newspaper, a High Court writ reveals.
Catering boss Kenny Wee Ho is being sued for HK$90 million by the companies from which he bought the free Metro Daily newspaper, a High Court writ reveals.
Metro International AB, a Swedish media company, and Metro Investment Holdings, its Hong Kong subsidiary, allege that Wee's Metro News Corporation failed to make payments according to a contract agreed in December for the sale of the city's first free newspaper.
The writ says the contract concerned the sale of Metro Publishing Hong Kong, Gift Box Company and Metro Logistic. The parties entered into the contract in December and the agreement was amended in March.
The contract stipulated that Metro News and Wee would make payments of HK$60 million and later HK$30 million to the Swedish publisher.
The Swedish company says in the writ that it is seeking payment of the two sums, compensation for its losses and damages for breach of contract. The publisher launched its first free newspaper in Stockholm in 1995. It later expanded across Europe and the Americas.
It launched in Hong Kong in 2002, distributing 400,000 copies in MTR stations every weekday morning. A glut of competitors have since entered the free newspaper market.