What It Is
Franchising · Markets · Taiwan · Bubble Tea · Business ReportTratopedia · 24 Aug 2026
A global bubble-tea exporter buys its way into the country it came from
Twenty-Six Shops at Home
La Kaffa International sells Taiwanese bubble tea in sixty-three countries. Its Chatime network runs to about 1,400 shops: 420 in Indonesia, 180 in the Philippines, 168 in Australia. In Taiwan it had twenty-six. In January 2025 it bought Hanlin, a forty-outlet chain from Tainan founded in 1986, for NT$272 million — roughly nine times what Hanlin earns in a year, and more than twice what comparable deals had been costing. Hanlin is famous for one thing: claiming it invented the drink. In 2019 a court ruled that nobody did.
What is established, and how firmly Sorted by standing. Company announcements and results first; what nobody has separated, last.
- 26Chatime outlets in Taiwan, against 420 in Indonesia
- NT$272mpaid for 100% of Hanlin, at NT$68 a share — exactly 4 million shares
- 0.68×of Hanlin’s 2024 revenue — comparable deals had run nearer a quarter
- NT$2.13earnings per share in the first half of 2026, against NT$1.09 for all of 2025
- 3acquisitions inside that number — Hanlin’s share of it is not published
| Standing | What is established | Where it comes from |
|---|---|---|
| Confirmed | On 6 January 2025 La Kaffa’s board resolved to acquire 100% of Hanlin International at NT$68 a share, NT$272 million, as a strategic long-term investment. Hanlin was consolidated into group revenue from March 2025. | 食力 foodNEXT, 6 and 7 January 2025 |
| Confirmed | Chatime ran about 1,400 outlets in 63 countries across six continents: Indonesia 420, Philippines 180, Australia 168, Canada 133, Malaysia 45 — and Taiwan 26. Hanlin’s 40 take the domestic estate to about 66, still under 5% of the network. | 自由財經, 10 November 2024 |
| Confirmed | Hanlin was founded in Tainan in October 1986 by 涂宗和 and runs about 40 outlets — 18 sit-down tea rooms and 22 tea stands — plus a hotpot brand and 嚮茶. Revenue was about NT$400 million in 2024, with NT$450 million targeted for 2025 at a 7–8% margin. | 食力 foodNEXT and 數位時代, January 2025 |
| Reported | The price works out at roughly eight to nine times Hanlin’s expected annual profit and 0.68 times its 2024 revenue. An industry assessment quoted at the time put it at about nine times profit, against comparable deals nearer a quarter of annual revenue. | 數位時代, 7 January 2025, and our own arithmetic on the published margin target |
| Company account | Chairman 王耀輝 said the merger fills an operating model La Kaffa’s own brands did not have. Trade analysis identifies that model concretely: Hanlin’s food — oden and braised snacks reaching 30% or more of takings at the tea-stand format, served almost with the drink. | 食力 foodNEXT; 數位時代 |
| Not separated | Hanlin’s own contribution to the group result. First-half 2026 revenue was NT$2,654 million, up 35%, with EPS of NT$2.13 against NT$1.09 for the whole of 2025 — but three acquisitions, a German consolidation, organic openings and an overseas restructuring are all inside that figure, and every source names them together. | 中央社, 10 August 2026; MoneyDJ |
| Not established | Which court decided the 2019 bubble-tea case, its case number, and what was actually pleaded. Six outlets reported the holding on the day and none names the court or the cause of action; no judgment text was read. | Absence established by reading all six reports |
Timeline
Forty years from a market stall to a share price Every dated item. The invention itself is not one of them.
- 1983劉漢介 opens 陽羨茶行 on 四維街 in Taichung, the shop that becomes Chun Shui Tang.
- Oct 1986涂宗和 opens the first Hanlin shop in Tainan. Its account is that it put white tapioca from 鴨母寮 market into milk tea and named the drink for the pearls.
- Mar 1987Chun Shui Tang’s account: 林秀慧, then manager of the 四維 branch, mixes market tapioca into foam milk tea on a whim and puts it on sale at NT$25 a cup.
- 2004La Kaffa International is founded. Chatime becomes its export brand.
- 31 Jul 2019After ten years of litigation, the court holds that pearl milk tea is a new kind of beverage and not a patented product, that anyone may make it, and that there is no need to determine an originator. Neither side wins. Both say afterwards they are content with the result.
- 6 Jan 2025La Kaffa’s board resolves to buy 100% of Hanlin International at NT$68 a share, NT$272 million, as a strategic long-term investment.
- Jan 2025In the same week, Milksha 迷客夏 — 314 outlets in Taiwan — buys 70% of the thirteen-shop food chain 雙月食品社 for NT$103.8 million, with NT$35 million more planned. Two drinks chains buying food businesses in one week.
- Mar 2025Hanlin is consolidated into La Kaffa’s group revenue.
- 2025The group also acquires the restaurant business 養心餐飲 through 王座國際. Full-year 2025 earnings come in at NT$1.09 a share, with a fourth quarter of NT$0.81 — the strongest of the four.
- Jan 2026Germany BoBoQ begins contributing. Monthly revenue reaches NT$423 million, up 31.59% — a six-year high, and the seventh consecutive month of growth.
- 12 Aug 2026The board approves first-half accounts showing NT$2,654 million of revenue, NT$157 million of operating profit and NT$2.13 a share — already ahead of the whole of 2025 — and declares a half-year dividend of NT$2.00. Hanlin has opened three new outlets in the half.
The one thing with no date is the thing the story is about. There is a shop in Taichung with a year, a street and a named manager. There is a shop in Tainan with a market, a supplier and the name it gave the drink. There are ten years of litigation and a judgment. What there is not is a date on which bubble tea was invented, and after 2019 there is a ruling that there does not need to be one. Every other item on this page can be placed. The invention cannot, and it never will be.
- 10years of litigation, ending in a holding that the question did not need answering.
- 5years between that judgment and the purchase of the shop that made the claim.
- 66Taiwan outlets after the deal, from 26 — still under 5% of the network.
The Argument
It bought a kitchen, not a legend The headline is the lawsuit. The valuation is about oden.
Every account of this deal leads with the lawsuit, and the money says the lawsuit is not what was bought. Hanlin is worth writing about because it spent a decade arguing that it invented bubble tea. But a court had already refused to award that claim to anyone: pearl milk tea is a new kind of drink, not a patented product, and there is no originator to name. Whatever La Kaffa acquired in January 2025, it was not a right, because there was no right to acquire. What it did acquire is a format. La Kaffa sells drinks through kiosks in sixty-three countries; Hanlin runs eighteen sit-down tea rooms where the average bill is over NT$500, and twenty-two tea stands where oden and braised snacks are a third of the takings and arrive at the same moment as the drink. That is a business the buyer did not have and could not easily build, and the trade press named it as the reason the price made sense. And the price needed a reason. Eight to nine times expected profit, or 0.68 times revenue, against comparable deals at nearer a quarter of revenue. The story is what makes the shop famous. The kitchen is what makes it worth NT$272 million.
- 30%+of takings at Hanlin’s tea stands is food, not drink.
- 0.68×revenue paid, against comparable deals nearer 0.25×.
- NT$500average bill at a Hanlin tea room, against NT$150 at a tea stand.
A claim a court refused to award still had a buyer
The 2019 judgment is unusually clean: the drink is not anyone’s property, and the question of who made it first does not need an answer. Five years later a listed company paid NT$272 million for the shop that had spent a decade insisting the answer was itself. Nothing improper follows from that — a brand people associate with an origin is worth something whether or not the origin can be proved, and the buyer said plainly it was buying an operating model. But it is worth being exact about what changed hands: an association, a menu and forty leases. Not a fact.
What the results cannot show
Half-year earnings of NT$2.13 a share against NT$1.09 for the whole of 2025 is a real change and it is tempting to read it as this deal working. It cannot be read that way. Hanlin and 養心餐飲 were both bought during 2025, Germany BoBoQ began contributing in January 2026, the group restructured its overseas operations from the second quarter of 2025, and Chatime added a net nineteen outlets worldwide in the second quarter of 2026 alone. Every source that reports the jump names all of them. Hanlin’s own contribution has not been published, and three new Hanlin outlets in six months is the only figure specific to it.
What Others Add
The two founding stories, the food economics, and the week two chains did the same thing From the 2019 court reporting, trade analysis, and the wires covering the sector this month.
The lawsuit
Two shops, two stories, and a judge who declined to choose
- Chun Shui Tang dates itself to 1983 and its invention to March 1987: a branch manager, 林秀慧, mixing market tapioca into foam milk tea on a whim, sold at NT$25 a cup.
- Hanlin dates itself to October 1986 in Tainan, and says it saw white tapioca at 鴨母寮 market, put it in milk tea, and named the drink 珍珠 — pearls — because that is what the cooked tapioca looked like.
- The holding, after ten years: pearl milk tea is a new kind of beverage and not a patented product, anyone may prepare it, and there is no need to decide who was first. Both parties said afterwards they were content.
- What none of the six reports carries: the court, the case number, or what was pleaded. The holding is consistent across all of them; the mechanics are absent from all of them, and no judgment text was read for this article.
The pattern
Two drinks chains bought food businesses in the same week
- Milksha 迷客夏, with 314 outlets in Taiwan, bought 70% of 雙月食品社 — thirteen shops, into Singapore in 2024 — for NT$103.8 million, with NT$35 million more planned.
- Both buyers gave the same reason in the same words: a new growth curve, built on the group’s existing brands and supply chain.
- Nineteen months on the two parents are reported together as leaving the drinks trade for a food platform: La Kaffa at NT$2,654 million of half-year revenue and NT$2.13 a share, 聯發國際 — Milksha’s parent — at NT$610 million and NT$1.53.
The export estate
The company is Taiwanese; the shops are mostly not
- Indonesia is the largest market at 420 outlets, 30% of the network, then the Philippines at 180, Australia at 168, Canada at 133 and Malaysia at 45. Taiwan is 26 — 1.9%.
- The group targets 2,500 outlets worldwide within three years of its 2024 planning. Indonesia’s distributor has extended its agency for fifteen years and undertaken to open 300 more.
- What 26 means is not established here. A master-franchise exporter can hold a small home estate on purpose. The number is a fact; a diagnosis of the domestic business would need figures nobody has published.
Conclusion
What it means, depending on where you are reading from Three positions, and the same set of facts reads differently from each.
If you buy the tea
More Hanlin, and probably more food with it
- Three new Hanlin outlets opened in the first half of 2026, and the buyer has said it wants to systematise the operation and take the brand abroad again. The tea rooms and the food are the part being bought for, so they are the part likeliest to spread.
- What the deal does not settle is the drink’s origin, which a court has already said will never be settled. Anyone selling you the first cup is selling you a story.
If you hold the shares
The group is growing, and this deal’s share of it is unpublished
- First-half 2026 revenue of NT$2,654 million and NT$2.13 a share, against NT$1.09 for all of 2025, with a NT$2.00 half-year dividend — NT$1.50 from earnings and NT$0.50 from capital surplus.
- Three acquisitions, one new consolidation and an overseas restructuring are inside that. Anyone attributing the improvement to this deal is doing so without a published number.
If you read founder stories
An unowned origin is still an asset
- The court’s answer was that the question did not need answering, and that is the cleanest possible outcome: nobody owns the drink, and everybody may sell it. It did not stop the claim being worth money five years later.
- The lesson is not that the story was worthless but that it was not the item being priced. The buyer said it was buying an operating model, and the one independent valuation read here agreed with the buyer, not with the headline.
Three things to hold loosely
Hanlin’s contribution to the group result is not published, so no figure here shows this deal working or failing. The court record is incomplete — six reports agree on the holding and none names the court, the case number or the cause of action, and no judgment text was read. And NT$272 million divided by forty shops is arithmetic, not a valuation: what changed hands was a company with four brands, a supply chain and a kitchen, and the one measure that matters is the multiple of profit, which depends on a margin that was a target rather than a result.