Custommade dressed Denmark for 22 years — a few unpaid debtors finished it
A profitable Copenhagen fashion house with a gross profit of DKK 11M — and debts built up when large customers simply did not pay. Bankrupt in February 2024.
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3,222 CAS PUBLIÉS · MIS À JOUR RÉGULIÈREMENTSonder bet on a Marriott lifeline — when Marriott cut it, guests were evicted mid-stay
A $2B SPAC valuation, thousands of rooms in 40-plus cities, and one partner holding the bookings. On a Sunday night the partner walked, and the rooms locked.
Lire le casHEDONE went from Tmall's breakout makeup brand to closure in six years
Sequoia-backed, ¥10M months within half a year of launch — and no funding after 2019. When cheap white-label makeup arrived, the traffic model died.
Lire le casVitro let its own subsidiaries vote on its bankruptcy plan — and a US court threw it out
The Mexican glassmaker's restructuring gave insiders the votes and equity a $500M stake. US noteholders fought to Texas, and won.
Lire le casJumei went from a $379 share to a founder's buyout below its IPO price
China's biggest beauty e-tailer lost its shoppers to counterfeit scandals, and its founder spent the money on power banks and phones instead.
Lire le casMei Jian's New Year ads joked a daughter wasn't worthy — then came down
The plum-wine brand's supermarket posters went viral for the wrong lines. Two days later: an apology, a review-process admission, and every poster removed.
Lire le casAlibaba hired its way to 254,941 employees — then cut more than 50,000 in two years
China's largest private employer staffed for a boom that ended. By 2024 the headcount was falling faster than it had ever grown.
Lire le casLacoste's 'sustainable clothing' ad was banned — the claim had no evidence behind it
One paid Google ad, two words: 'sustainable clothing'. The ASA ruled that without proof of no environmental harm across the life cycle, the claim misleads.
Lire le casRoyole beat Samsung to the foldable phone — then sold only tens of thousands of them
A $6B valuation, the world's first foldable screen, and almost no revenue. In 2024 a Shenzhen court declared the pioneer bankrupt.
Lire le casChagee told novel fans what they could post — and learned that fandoms do not take orders
Chagee's first IP collab banned fans from posting about their favorite character pairings. The backlash trended on Weibo; the apology said 'we messed up'.
Lire le casBritain's food supply ran on one company's waste gas — then it turned off the plants
Two fertiliser plants made 60% of the UK's food-grade CO2 as a by-product. When gas prices made them unviable, the food chain had days, not weeks.
Lire le casRunbaiyan picked a KOL whose fans call themselves 'dogs' — and its female customers walked
A skincare brand built on women's spending forwarded a KOL whose fans call themselves 'dogs'. The apology came in 24 hours; the KOLs left anyway.
Lire le casThe Alley went viral before it owned its trademark — 7,000 copycats moved in
China's hottest milk tea brand entered the mainland with a pending trademark. Copycats franchised thousands of stores; the courts took three years.
Lire le casCarl Icahn loaded TWA with $540M in debt — it filed for bankruptcy three times
Icahn's 1988 leveraged buyout buried Trans World Airlines under debt it could never outrun. Three Chapter 11s later, American Airlines bought the remains.
Lire le casBRF bribed inspectors and masked rotten meat — China banned Brazilian meat in days
Federal police found rotten meat masked with carcinogenic acids and inspectors on the payroll. China, the EU and three more markets banned Brazilian meat.
Lire le casMicrosoft promised a browser ballot screen, then accidentally skipped it for 14 months
Microsoft promised the EU a browser ballot screen in 2009, dropped it from Windows 7 SP1 for 14 months, and paid €561M for the oversight.
Lire le casBP bet $8B on a Russian joint venture — then the oligarch partners squeezed it out
BP formed a 50-50 JV with Russian billionaires in 2003, then faced a vicious dispute in 2008 and was forced to sell to Rosneft in 2013.
Lire le casDanone's activist investors fired its CEO for caring more about the planet than profits
Emmanuel Faber turned Danone into the world's first listed B Corp, then lost his job when shareholders said it wasn't profitable enough.
Lire le casGo First grounded half its fleet on faulty P&W engines — then filed for bankruptcy
India's Go First blamed Pratt & Whitney engine failures for grounding 25 planes. Lost ₹1,080 crore ($1.3bn) in revenue, filed for bankruptcy in May 2023.
Lire le casGoogle forced Android makers to pre-install its search and paid €4.34B for the privilege
Google forced phone makers to pre-install Search and Chrome for Play Store access. The EC fined it €4.34B, upheld on final appeal in 2026.
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