Alumni Story | Social Enterprises must be Sustainable to Survive -- Interview with Cynthia Huang, Executive Director and CSO of UDN Packaging

Serial entrepreneur, leader of an international packaging brand, and franchisee of a social enterprise, Cynthia Huang is a highly versatile leader capable of founding, building, maintaining and expanding all manner of businesses. Currently a student of the CEIBS Global EMBA 2023 class, Cynthia is committed to embedding ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) into every part of her professional life. For her, “doing well” and “doing good” in business can and should go hand in hand.
Each of her roles and each of her ventures has deepened her conviction that ESG is not simply an exercise in public relations and jumping through regulatory hoops; it is a fundamentally necessary mindset that futureproofs a business, strengthening its sustainability in the economic sense as well as in social and environmental aspects.
This ethos is a core part of Cynthia’s professional work as well as her Global EMBA journey. An extraordinary multitasker, she leads UDN’s sustainability efforts while also conducting her Global EMBA studies, in the meantime starting up her own new business, all while simultaneously taking over the Shenzhen franchise of Dialogue in the Dark, a social enterprise that is close to her heart and critical to her ESG-led philosophy on business.
Cynthia believes that social enterprise – businesses aiming to create a positive societal impact as well as profits – can be seen as a “stress test” for the entire concept of ESG itself. To remain viable in the long term, a social enterprise must work successfully as a business, not just as a force for social good. Neither half can be allowed to compromise the other.

Cynthia Huang
Executive Director and CSO, UDN Packaging
CEIBS Global EMBA 2023
Dipping into the Ice Cream Business
“You learn more from your failures than your successes,” Cynthia says. “Sometimes, you don’t fully realise the lessons of the failure until months or even years later. The key thing I learned from building an ice cream brand is to never stop asking questions, especially when things are going well.”
Born in Shenzhen, Cynthia’s early professional experiences as a marketer were in real estate and elderly care, which gave her an early exposure to the impact that ESG can have. However, after discovering her entrepreneurial spirit, she co-founded a company with two high school classmates, attempting to create a high-end ice cream brand in China.
Given that the market was then dominated by foreign brands, the idea had plenty of appeal. Several funding rounds later, the company was evaluated at up to RMB 100 million from various well-known venture capital firms, and things were looking extremely promising.
“Sadly, the sales didn’t quite live up to the valuation or expectations,” Cynthia shares. “However, the whole experience was invaluable in terms of teaching me how to build something from scratch, how to constantly reassess the value offering versus the target customer’s needs and a thousand smaller lessons. Afterward, I knew I wanted to do something that was entrepreneurial but also meaningful.”

Cynthia in the CEIBS Global EMBA Classroom
Embracing ESG – Social Good paired with Good Business Sense
Around the same time, Cynthia met her husband, whose family owns and operates UDN, an international packaging solutions company specialising in plastic tubes for the cosmetics industry.
Together, the pair have steadily integrated ESG principles into every facet of the company, with a particular focus on lightening the environmental impact of their products. They’ve widely adopted green materials including bio-resins and Post-Consumer Resin (PCR), alongside design and manufacturing processes that incorporate the 5Rs – Reuse, Reduce, Recycle Replace and Renew.
However, as CSO, Cynthia wants to go further in bringing ESG principles into the daily operations and broader strategy of the company. This has led her to one of the world’s most exciting and innovative social enterprises.

Cynthia at the UDN show in Hong Kong
Dialogue in the Dark – Social Enterprise is not the same as Charity
Developed over the course of the last 34 years, Dialogue in the Dark (DiD) is a unique experience in which visitors are led by visual impaired guides around specially designed environments that are enveloped in complete darkness. This pushes the visitor out of their comfort zone while opening their eyes to a completely different living experience.
With franchises operating across 47 countries, this is a uniquely adaptive business, offering workshops and teambuilding activities for corporate clients and all manner of varied experiences from café and dinner sessions to live concerts and art exhibitions. After being introduced to the concept via a business case in her CEIBS Global EMBA studies, Cynthia instantly recognised its value both socially and economically, leading her to the acquisition decision of the Shenzhen franchise later.
“I knew it was right for me because DiD is a perfect example of how social enterprise should operate,” Cynthia recalls. “It is not the same as charity. Charity relies on goodwill, on donations based on sympathy or empathy, whereas social enterprise satisfies a consumer need. It proves itself by being economically viable as well as ethical and socially impactive. That’s what makes it so empowering to the people it is supposed to help.”
Since taking on the franchise, Cynthia has moved fast. She recently held a concert under the Dialogue in the Dark umbrella, where one of her (sighted) classmates played guitar with the band of visual impaired musicians. She has also taken UDN executives and managers to DiD experiences to help broaden their life perspectives and, accordingly, their interpersonal and other soft skills.

Concert organised by the DiD Shenzhen franchise
“It’s been transformative for me and my colleagues. I feel like this is validation of the idea that ESG is something to be actively adopted as a vehicle for improving your business, rather than an obstacle to negotiate. We’re in an age where consumers are much closer to the companies they purchase from, so it’s good business sense to show that you genuinely care about improving society while still making money. You can do both, and it’s clear to me that both elements can support one another,” Cynthia says.
The DiD Shenzhen franchise is also the focus of Cynthia’s CEIBS Global EMBA Capstone project. Currently halfway through the process, she and her Capstone team are developing a future business strategy to scale up this social enterprise without compromising its core ESG function. This should provide Cynthia with the direction and support to take her part of DiD to the next level, further validating the social enterprise model.

Cynthia with her Global EMBA Capstone Project Team
Instinct Backed with Data – A Powerful Combination
Looking ahead, Cynthia is never content to rest on her past achievements; in fact, she is already thinking about a new venture. While developing DiD via her Capstone Project, she has also started to pull together ideas for a startup from a quality education perspective, based on her growing ESG expertise.
Cynthia feels that all the parts of her professional life are interconnected. Bringing corporate and social enterprise together is at the heart of her ESG philosophy, which is that positive societal impact should also be practical.
While admittedly a “go with your gut” business leader, Cynthia’s parting advice is to always take the time to ask questions and consult the data and facts to support your intuition.
“Instinct is essential, but it will only take you so far if you’re working in a complex, fast-moving industry,” she says. “Things change so fast and if you’re not out there experiencing these changes directly, your gut feeling might be off, making it more of an uninformed gamble. That’s why I joined the CEIBS Global EMBA programme; I wanted to test my instincts and back them with the right knowledge and real-world information so that I can embrace my next challenge in work and in life.”

Cynthia and her CEIBS Global EMBA classmates at a charity event