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Jean Liu is stepping i’m sick as president and from the board of Didi, the Chinese language ride-hailing vast she co-founded a decade in the past and had led on the moment of its botched US percentage sale in 2021.
As soon as Didi’s community ambassador and a few of the maximum high-profile feminine leaders in Chinese language tech, the 45-year-old will stay on the corporate as important family officer, in line with an e-mail despatched by way of Didi important Cheng Wei and Liu to workers on Sunday.
She joined Didi from Goldman Sachs in 2014 and hosted Apple’s Tim Cook dinner two years after in Beijing, securing $1bn from the USA tech vast to gas Didi’s enlargement. She received billions extra from traders corresponding to SoftBank. When driver-passenger violence penniless out in a Didi automotive, she flew to the scene to condolense kinfolk.
However upcoming the crowd’s $4.4bn Brandnew York preliminary community providing got here below investigation by way of Beijing, Liu went still. The corporate delisted and suffered a $1bn positive from Chinese language regulators for “vile” breaches of the rustic’s knowledge regulations.
Liu made undisclosed her years of Weibo posts and took a extra behind-the-scenes function on the corporate, two Didi workers mentioned. Internally many blamed her for pushing the IPO and for the corporate’s resulting regulatory troubles, they mentioned.
In 2023, her manage lieutenant, Stephen Zhu, who had adopted Liu to Didi from Goldman Sachs, stepped i’m sick as a Didi director and not ranks as a manage legitimate of their SEC filings.
Of their memo to body of workers, Cheng mentioned that even though Liu would not be president, “the departments and responsibilities under her management remain unchanged” and that she was once his “closest comrade and partner”.
Liu will center of attention on “organisational transformation and talent development, and work with me to promote the company’s efforts in social responsibility”, Cheng wrote. He added that Didi would now not appoint a fresh president.
Liu mentioned she initiated the trade to concentrate on Didi’s long-term enlargement, noting she had “experienced many emotions and been deeply moved” right through her 10 years on the corporate, and was once “filled with anticipation and eagerness for the future”.
“Please rest assured, I will continue to fight alongside everyone to welcome the coming 10 years at Didi in the best state possible,” she mentioned.
Liu’s advance from govt positions may just lengthen the corporate’s hoped-for Hong Kong checklist, which shareholders have driven for for the reason that corporate moved to over the counter buying and selling in the USA in 2022. The Hong Kong accumulation alternate normally calls for firms to attend a 12 months to listing upcoming converting senior executives.
Liu’s identify trade comes because the Chinese language workforce’s funds display indicators of steadying. Closing 12 months, Didi narrowed its working loss to Rmb5.7bn ($790mn) and swung to a Rmb535mn web benefit with the assistance of funding and pastime source of revenue.
The gang retained nearly all of its customers right through Beijing’s months-long probe, right through which its app was once cancelled. In 2021, Chinese language officers had been stationed for months at its Beijing workplaces.
The turmoil has left US traders with immense losses. Didi’s accumulation value continues to be i’m sick about 65 in keeping with cent from its checklist value of $14 a percentage and the debacle badly broken investor self belief in Chinese language tech firms. Beijing has but to permit every other immense tech corporate to promote stocks in the USA.
Supplementary reporting by way of Cheng Leng in Hong Kong
