By Lorna Tan

After working for more than a decade as a manager at SingTel, Ms Priscilla Lim hung up her power suits in 2008 and became a franchisee of an all-women gym, Contours Express.

With her savings of $120,000, Ms Lim, 36, set up her first gym at Block 253, Serangoon Central Drive, in September of that year. So far, it has more than 300 members. Last December, she opened her second gym at Block 930, Yishun Central, with a partner with a capital of $130,000. It has attracted nearly 150 members.

Ms Lim said she went into business because she wanted the challenge of starting something on her own. Her working hours would also be more flexible, so she could look after her four young children.

Both her father and husband, who run their own firms, were supportive of her move.

Besides her fitness business, Ms Lim likes to invest in shares and commercial properties like shophouses for their stable rental yields. In 2006, she and her husband, Mr Chua Bin Leong, 36, set up a firm, Super Choice Investment, to hold their investment properties, which currently stand at three.

She graduated with an honours degree in electrical and electronic engineering from Bradford University, Yorkshire, England, in 1997.

Her husband is a businessman who manufactures plastic bags. They have four children: daughters Yun Jie, eight, and Yun Yu, two, and sons Dong Shen, seven, and Dong En, four.

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