This article first appeared in The Edge Malaysia Weekly on September 23, 2024 - September 29, 2024

Last Thursday, Green Packet Bhd (KL:GPACKET) announced that its managing director Datuk Seri Dr Shahril Mohktar had stepped down from the technology firm after almost a year in the job. In a brief stock exchange filing, the company said it was a “retirement”. Shahril is 51.

His departure comes a week after Green Packet announced that four of six investors who were expected to subscribe for its private placement of 598 million shares — Dr Prem Kumar, Roberto Guiati, Chan Yok Peng and Ler Pei Fen — had mutually agreed to terminate their subscription agreements. The agreements with the two other investors, Chow Dai Ying and Tay Guat En, remain in effect. The company did not say more.

The funds from the private placement, which had been proposed in April — representing 30% of its issued shares at 3.2 sen each and totalling RM19.15 million — were intended to support its joint venture with the Sri Lankan government on an integrated tourism digital platform, a money lending business, and for working capital.

Given the lack of a clear explanation as to why Shahril — formerly managing director of Prasarana Malaysia Bhd and CEO of Mass Rapid Transport Corp Sdn Bhd — is retiring after less than a year, when he is only 51, one would be forgiven for wondering whether there is more to his sudden departure, especially since it comes close on the heels of the withdrawal of the four investors.

Adding to this is the fact that the company had made losses in the last two quarters, raising questions as to what its plans are to bring it back to profitability.

The two developments could well have nothing to do with Shahril’s departure, but the onus should have been on Green Packet to make things clear, for avoidance of doubt.

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