PRIVATE cord-blood bank Cordlife Group : P8A 0% on Monday (Feb 19) announced that it has appointed Yiu Pang Fai as its next group chief executive officer with immediate effect.

He succeeds Tan Poh Lan, who tendered her resignation to “pursue personal interests” in October last year, said the healthcare group in a bourse filing.

The company disclosed that Yiu’s brother, Yiu Ming Yiu, is a non-independent, non-executive director of Cordlife.

In addition, Yiu Pang Fai’s father, Yiu Chi Shing, as well as his mother, Lui Yim Sheung, are deemed interested in the shares of Cordlife held by TransGlobal Real Estate Group, which is a controlling shareholder of the healthcare group.

Cordlife’s latest annual report noted that TransGlobal Real Estate Group has a 27.9 per cent stake in the company as at Mar 20, 2023.

Prior to his appointment as Cordlife’s group CEO, Yiu Pang Fai was an executive director of TransGlobal Group’s family office division in Hong Kong. He has also held executive positions at Popular Holdings, Sichuan Chengmian Expressway and Hebei Shitai Expressway, said Cordlife.

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“Before joining TransGlobal Group, Yiu served as an investment manager at Macquarie Infrastructure and Real Assets in Singapore,” noted the company.

It added that Yiu Pang Fai had “executed high-profile deals”, such as the acquisition of petrochemical tank storage provider Oiltanking Singapore Chemical Storage, during his time at Macquarie.

Cordlife’s board said that it had considered the recommendation of the nominating committee and assessed Yiu Pang Fai’s qualification and experience, and was of the view that he had the requisite experience and capability to assume the role of group CEO.

Outgoing group CEO Tan’s last day was previously announced to be Mar 31.

Tan and the company have since agreed that Feb 19 would be the effective date of her cessation as executive director and group CEO, although she would work with Yiu Pang Fai to facilitate “the smooth transition of the leadership of the company” until Mar 31.

The change in leadership comes amid Cordlife serving a six-month suspension from collecting, testing, processing and/or storing new cord blood and human tissue.

The suspension was issued by the Ministry of Health (MOH) in November last year, after an audit found that the private cord-blood bank had exposed cryopreserved cord-blood units in seven tanks at suboptimal temperatures of above -150 degrees Celsius.

At the time, the cord-blood units in one of the seven tanks were confirmed to have been damaged. The 2,200 cord-blood units in the tank belong to at least 2,150 clients.

In January, MOH said the final results of the tests on Cordlife’s impacted cord-blood units will be ready by end-March.

It also found three other process lapses at Cordlife and said it would require the healthcare group to rectify these issues by end-May.

Cordlife began serving its six-month suspension from Dec 15. Its accreditation by the Foundation of the Accreditation of Cellular Therapy has also been suspended indefinitely.

Cordlife shares ended unchanged at S$0.30 on Monday, before the announcement.