E-commerce tycoon Colin Huang becomes China’s richest person

As the 25th richest person in the world, Huang has surpassed beverage tycoon Zhong Shanshan who follows right behind with a net worth of $47.3 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Huang’s net worth has declined by almost 6% since the beginning of the year, while that of Shanshan has plunged 30%.

Huang stepped down as chairman of Nasdaq-listed PDD in 2021 but remained the largest shareholder with a 26.5% stake, according to U.S. regulatory filings.

Born in 1980, Huang has been described as a math genius and earned a scholarship at a school for Chinese talents. He graduated with a degree in computer science from Zhejiang University and left China in 2002.

Two years later, he started his career as a Google engineer in the U.S. and founded PDD (formerly called Pinduoduo) in 2015, focusing on selling low-cost products with many big promotions.

Although PDD was established two decades after competitors such as Alibaba and JD.com, it quickly grew to a $185 billion e-commerce giant by utilizing a discount strategy.

Huang resigned as chairman of PDD in February 2021 but remained a major shareholder.

In addition to cheap prices, the company has a quite high market share in lower-tier cities and markets,” says Kenny Ng, a Hong Kong-based securities strategist at Everbright Securities International, as cited by Forbes.

“Market competition will continue, but I think PDD has big advantages.”

PDD launched its international platform Temu in the U.S. in 2022. It quickly gained a large number of customers by offering affordable products shipped from China.

This shopping platform quickly soared to the top download position in smartphone app stores in the U.S., as consumers there, weary of inflation, sought to save money by purchasing cheap and unbranded products.

“In this economic environment, obviously people are looking for great value for their money, people are looking for low prices,” said Neil Saunders, a retail analyst at GlobalData Retail.

“So this is a time to shine for value retailers like Temu,” Bloomberg quoted him as saying.

Temu has since expanded into Europe where it now has 75 million monthly active users. It is also present in Latin America and other regions.

By November last year, PDD’s market value had surpassed Alibaba’s, making it China’s second-largest internet company.

In the first quarter this year, PDD’s net profit tripled from the previous year, reaching CNY28 billion (US$3.91 billion).