A Central European family owned just over 70% of an industrial company they had built over almost thirty years. When a strategic buyer from Western Europe offered to acquire most of the business, they faced a transaction size well beyond anything they had handled before, leaving them with a minority stake and a cash position measured in tens of millions of euros. Until that point, almost all of their wealth had been tied up in the operating company, with a few rental properties and short‑term deposits in local banks. There was no agreed view inside the family on what to sell and what to keep, or on what life should look like once the deal was done.
Suchy Team began by helping the family articulate what they wanted from the sale beyond the headline price: how far they were willing to dilute control and how much liquidity they wanted up front. We brought their existing legal and tax advisers around a single written brief and timetable. In parallel, we worked with the family to map their post‑sale position in plain numbers: likely net proceeds after tax, how much they needed for spending over the next few years, what they wanted to reserve for future business projects, and what could sit in a long‑term portfolio. The old reliance on a dividend stream from the company was replaced with a deliberately constructed portfolio and a defined liquidity buffer, under an agreed framework for distributions to different family members. Once the main decisions were made, we coordinated estate‑planning work with specialist firms, updating key documents so that the new capital could move in an orderly way if something happened to the senior generation
The sale was completed on the timetable the family had set and on terms they had agreed to in advance. The remaining minority stake continued to generate dividends, but the family was no longer dependent on that income alone. The new cash was invested in stages over several quarters, avoiding a single “all‑in” moment at one point in the market cycle. By the time the transaction was fully settled, the family could see on two or three pages what they owned, how liquid it was, who was entitled to what, and how it might behave in a downturn. Lastly, their external advisers were all reporting into the same picture.
A family whose wealth originated in the Czech Republic had, over two generations, spread across three European countries. After selling a minority stake in the original manufacturing business, they held operating companies and other assets across Prague, Vienna and Zurich. Major decisions were still concentrated with one family member in their late sixties, who had been the main decision‑taker since the 1990s. The next generation was split between those working in and around the business and those pursuing careers abroad in other fields. There was no agreed view on who should be involved in which decisions, or how that would change over the next decade, and governance conversations tended to surface only when there was a disagreement about an investment or a distribution.
Suchy Team started by sitting with the senior decision‑maker and one trusted adviser to map, in practical terms, which decisions they were actually taking: business strategy, larger investments, major donations, property purchases, appointments to boards and key roles in the holding structures. We then extended that map to include other family members, showing who already had informal influence and who was out of the loop. Together with the family, we agreed to introduce a regular quarterly meeting bringing together the senior generation and adult children, separate from operational company boards, with a short written agenda and notes afterwards. With the family’s lawyers, we prepared a concise, non‑technical guide to their main structures – a foundation, several holding companies and key shareholder agreements – explaining in four or five pages what each did and how decisions flowed through them alongside the formal documentation. Finally, we helped design a gradual involvement plan for the next generation: first attending selected meetings as observers, then taking on defined responsibilities in real projects that mattered to them.
Over the following year, the family moved away from sporadic, sometimes tense discussions prompted by immediate issues towards a more predictable rhythm of conversation. The senior decision‑maker remained firmly in charge of core questions, but there was now a shared understanding of which areas might be opened and on what timeline, which reduced anxiety on all sides. Younger family members reported feeling better informed and less dependent on second‑hand explanations after the fact. The underlying legal and ownership structures were not radically changed, but more people now understood them well enough to ask informed questions. That shift in understanding, rather than a new chart or committee, proved to be the starting point for calmer, more constructive governance work.
A Prague‑based family with significant holdings in Central and Western Europe had, over time, accumulated relationships with more than a dozen banks and investment managers. Accounts had been opened in response to specific opportunities without a central plan. Reporting consisted of a set of spreadsheets maintained by a long‑serving assistant, who spent several days every month downloading PDFs and then trying to reconcile them into something that resembled a consolidated overview. The family could quote an approximate net worth, but had no reliable answer to basic questions about liquidity, concentration or overall risk.
Suchy Team’s first step was to build an accurate inventory of all holdings and entities, showing each account, portfolio and company, who owned it and what its role was meant to be. That exercise quickly revealed overlapping strategies and mandates that had drifted away from their original purpose. We then helped the family implement a reporting set‑up that pulled position data from multiple custodians into a single source, which could be used to generate views by owner, by entity and by strategy, with far less manual handling. Existing banking and manager relationships were kept in place where they still served a purpose, but we worked with each institution to standardise how mandates were described and how reports were delivered, so that comparisons became straightforward rather than an exercise in interpretation.
Within a few reporting cycles, the family had moved away from dense spreadsheets towards a consolidated view they could refresh with much less effort and be used in real discussions. The assistant who had been spending most of their time on manual data entry shifted into a role focused on monitoring and project coordination. Overlapping mandates were reduced and fees became more transparent. Discussions with banks and managers changed tone: instead of each institution presenting its own slice in isolation, conversations were framed against a shared picture of the family’s capital and its role in the whole.
A family with long‑established business interests in Central Europe decided to move their primary home base from Prague to Munich. The move raised connected questions about tax residency, how existing holding structures would cope with the new pattern of life, which banks to use, how to handle property left behind and how to time school and university moves. A number of advisers were already involved in different parts of the picture, but nobody was responsible for holding it together.
Suchy Team worked with the family to set out, in writing, where each member expected to live and spend meaningful time over the coming years. That simple document became the base case for tax and legal advisers in each relevant jurisdiction. It allowed them to test residency and reporting obligations against the family’s actual plans rather than assumptions and to highlight where existing structures would no longer fit comfortably with the new pattern of life. Alongside the structural work, we managed practical steps: opening and bedding in banking relationships in the new country, arranging property sales or rentals on a realistic timetable, and putting local service providers in place for homes that would no longer be occupied full‑time. Together with the family, we agreed a short set of internal guidelines on travel and decision‑making, to reduce the risk of accidentally creating unwanted tax or regulatory exposure through day‑to‑day behaviour.
The relocation unfolded over roughly eighteen months, in stages rather than as a single move. As the family’s pattern of life shifted, their structures and banking arrangements were adjusted to match, rather than being left as an awkward fit. Advisers in different countries were working from the same core plan, which reduced conflicting advice and last‑minute surprises. By the time the move was complete, the family had a clearer view of their residency and of how their affairs were exposed across borders. Decisions about work and investment could then be made with that map in mind, rather than on intuition alone.