Scams|The Le Ankka restaurant of the founder and restaurateur Sari Helin of the media company Huono Äiti was listed in the Michelin Guide in May. After that, Helin received a phone call saying that an unknown company manager would like to buy his company.
The summary is made by artificial intelligence and checked by a human.
Sari Helin says that she was the target of an extraordinary fraud attempt.
In the spring, an unknown case manager called Helin and told him that his client would like to buy Helin’s companies.
Doubts arose when Helin’s son became familiar with the company represented by the case manager.
The company claims on its website that Wolt founder Miki Kuusi is its CTO.
Bad mother – media company founder, entrepreneur Sari Helin says the community service On Linkedin of being the target of an extraordinary fraud attempt.
In addition to the media company, Helin also works as an entrepreneur in the restaurant industry. He is the main owner of the restaurant Le Ankka in Helsinki and the museum restaurant Lusto in Punkaharju.
Le Ankka made it in May to the Michelin guide. After that, Helin received a phone call from an unknown case manager from London.
“He claimed to represent a big business leader who had allegedly eaten at Anka and was impressed. He wanted to buy Anka and all the background companies. The reason for that was that his daughter is studying in Finland and he wants to build an empire for her,” Helin tells HS.
According to Helin, the company director wanted to buy both Le Anka, the museum restaurant Lusto and the Huono Äiti media company.
No sales enthusiasm was found, but the contacts did not stop there. HS has seen screenshots, according to which the case manager called Helin several times during the summer using the Whatsapp application and sent her Whatsapp messages.
According to Helin, he was not made an actual purchase offer, but was asked the price, how much the restaurants and the Huono Äiti media company would pay in total.
“I threw something, but then they didn’t even ask to see any financial statement papers. So you don’t go blindly buying companies,” says Helin,
Doubts really woke up at the latest at the point when Helin’s son started to find out the background of the company represented by the case manager. An address to a genuine London location and an official-looking website were found for the company.
“At that point he [Helinin poika] said that here on the website is marked for operational duty Mickey Kuusi. And he said that it can’t be true, Miki Kuuse can’t have time for something like this,” says Helin.
Miki Kuusi is one of the founders of the courier company Wolt.
On its website, the company says that it operates, among other things, as an asset manager for wealthy families and foundations. The website still says that Kuusi would be the company’s technology director.
Helin says that he sent Kuusen a message about it on the Linkedin service.
“I told you what it was about, but he probably gets quite a lot of Linkedin messages. He must not have seen it.”
Sari Helin and Ilkka Lääveri opened the Le Ankka restaurant in 2023.
June at the end, the case manager asked that Heli and Le Anka’s chef Ilkka Lääveri would travel to meet the prospective buyer’s manager of European investments in Italy the very next week.
Helin and Lääveri did not agree to this. First of all, the museum restaurant in Lusto was in its busiest summer season, and secondly, Helin’s entrepreneur friend had warned them.
“He said that there was a very good chance that we would have been kidnapped and demanded a ransom,” says Helin.
Helin insisted that the parties should first hold a video meeting where everyone is present in person.
“I said let’s put a video meeting on the calendar, but they just kept bombarding me and called me to hold a Whatsapp meeting right away. But never when the cameras are on,” says Helin.
Because it was not possible to take anything from the entrepreneur and no actual damage was caused by the incident, Helin has not brought the matter to the attention of the authorities. Reporting to the police is indeed under consideration.
Helin considers the case to be an example of a hard-level international fraud attempt.
“Even the addresses were found in London. It was a very well-planned operation,” he says.
He doesn’t remember hearing about similar cases from other restaurateurs or entrepreneurs
“This was a unique case for us and really cleverly executed”
According to Helin, the suspected fraudsters have not continued their contact since nothing came of organizing a video meeting.
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