Yum China’s operations have taken on a life and direction of their own. Credit: Qilai Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Images
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In October 2015, Greg Creed had his back against a wall. The bespectacled Aussie was chief executive of Yum Brands, the U.S. fast food restaurant giant, and the company’s sluggish growth had turned its quarterly earnings call into something close to a day of reckoning. Earnings for the previous quarter and projections for the rest of the year were well below analyst expectations and quarterly sales at the company’s eateries, which include KFC, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell, were up a mere 2 percent.
For Kentucky-based Yum, much of the trouble originated from an unlikely place: China, long the crown-jewel of its quick-service empire. Decades ago, KFC had been the first Western fast-food restaurant to open its doors in the country, and the chain’s red-and-white chicken buckets had become familiar sights everywhere from Beijing to Kunming. But food safety scandals and fresh c
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