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Family Business Roundup: Hyundai, Lundin, and Market Basket

By Michael Finnigan

Hyundai announces multi-billion investment

Hyundai Motor Corporation, the Korea-based car company controlled by the Chung family, has announced a multi-billion euro investment to make up for its slowest sales growth in over a decade.

The carmaker said Tuesday that it plans to spend 80.7 trillion won (€62.5 billion) on new factories over the next four years and will be primarily focussed on research and development.

"By investing such a record amount, we are planning to focus on securing core technologies in environmentally-friendly cars, smart cars and other next-generation cars," Hyundai said in a statement

Hyundai Motor is headed by 76-year-old chairman Chung Mong-koo, son of Hyundai founder Chung Ju-yung. The Hyundai conglomerate split into two in the late nineties, with Hyundai Group being taken over by Chung's fourth son Chung Mong-hun.

Lundin reduces 2015 budget by one-third

Family-owned oil and gas company Lundin Petroleum has cut its expenditure for 2015 by 31% but said it plans to increase spending on its operations in Norway.

The company, which is 24.5% owned by the eponymous family, has set its development, appraisal and exploration budget for 2015 at $1.45 billion.

Ashley Heppenstall, chief executive of Lundin Petroleum, said: 'The major focus of our 2015 capital budget will be the completion of our development projects on Boyla, Bertam and Edvard Grieg which will increase our production to 75,000 boepd.”

Lundin added that 77% of its 2015 budgeted development expenditure will be related to on-going projects in Norway, with the rest being spent on the Bertam development in Malaysia.

The firm expects that its Brynhild, Boyla and Bertam development projects to be completed by the end of 2015 and said they will incur no further planned capital expenditure.

Market Basket installs new board of directors

US grocery chain Market Basket has installed a new board of directors after president Arthur T Demoulas completed a $1.6 billion deal in December to buy out his cousin Arthur S Demoulas and take control of the family business.

The new board is made of directors and others that have long worked with Arthur T, who after being ousted by Arthur S gained a groundswell of support from employees.

Meanwhile, a Kickstarter documentary detailing the longstanding family feud has reached its funding goal of $50,000 and will reportedly feature interviews with Market Basket executives, as well as members of the Demoulas family.

The feud began in 1994 after a judge ruled that Arthur T's side of the family had revalued assets to dilute their relatives' ownership stake.

Despite the feud, Market Basket, founded initially as a small grocery store in 1917, has grown to have annual revenues of more than $4 billion and over 21,000 employees.

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