Original Guo Ruyi’s business figure
Author: Guo Ruyi
In another week, 41-year-old Su Hua will no longer be the chairman of Aauto Quicker.
On the evening of 20th, according to the announcement issued by Aauto Quicker, from October 29th, Suhua will step down as chairman and be replaced by another founder, Cheng Yixiao. Cheng Yixiao also served as CEO of Aauto Quicker.
However, Su Hua is not completely out of Aauto Quicker. He continues to be an executive director and a member of the remuneration committee. More importantly, his different voting rights will not change.
This is another handover of Aauto Quicker’s top leadership power after Su Hua resigned as CEO two years ago. A week later, Cheng Yixiao will become the undisputed number one in company management.
Aauto Quicker, where Hong Kong stocks are listed, implements the arrangement that each share has different rights. Each class A share can cast ten votes, and each class B share can cast one vote. At present, Suhua’s shareholding ratio is nearly 10%, slightly higher than that of Cheng Yixiao, and it is the largest individual shareholder in Aauto Quicker. Su Hua also has more voting rights than Cheng Yixiao.
Aauto Quicker’s announcement specially emphasized that their voting rights have not changed, which still continues the current pattern of shareholders’ rights. But even so, in terms of internal governance, the influence of Suhua will undoubtedly be further diluted. According to Aauto Quicker’s official statement, he "has to focus on other affairs".
Ten years ago, Su Hua, who had been tossing and turning repeatedly between starting a business and a big factory, met Cheng Yixiao through the introduction of Aauto Quicker investors. At that time, Aauto Quicker had just started, and it was still a product for users to make and share GIF animation. The first meeting between the two touched Cheng Yixiao, and he decided to introduce Suhua, so he did not hesitate to give up his considerable shares.
Since then, Su Hua has served as CEO, Cheng Yixiao as Chief Product Officer, and Aauto Quicker has started to move towards running all the way as a short video giant.
Aauto Quicker’s entrepreneurial myth is one of the most eye-catching cases in the golden age of Internet in the past years. In February 2021, Aauto Quicker landed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange and became the "first short video". Now, its active users have reached hundreds of millions.
Su Hua also earned hundreds of millions of net worth by this. According to the 2023 Hurun Global Rich List, its wealth reached 31 billion yuan, ranking 668th. It took only ten years from obscurity to becoming a man of the hour in business.
In January this year, Suhua reduced its holdings in Aauto Quicker and cashed in about HK$ 3.8 billion. At that time, it was announced that it would "invest in charitable donations, cutting-edge scientific and technological exploration and infrastructure investment". Nowadays, there are fixed templates for the reasons of retiring or cashing out in the internet circle, that is, charity and cutting-edge technology. Suhua also used this trick, but the market didn’t seem to buy it, and Aauto Quicker’s share price plummeted by 6% the next day.
Su Hua’s resignation as chairman is the latest move of Aauto Quicker’s frequent personnel adjustment in recent years. Since the second half of 2021, the internal structure of Aauto Quicker has been adjusted many times, and it is not surprising that the authority of senior executives has changed and whether they will stay or not. Also in January this year, Aauto Quicker CTO Chen Dingjia resigned on the grounds that "more time should be devoted to family and personal affairs."
Corporate governance in Aauto Quicker once had a very distinctive feature, that is, the relatively rare dual-core governance. Similarly, R&F Property, a real estate industry, has been jointly run by Li Silian and Zhang Li for a long time, which is known as the dual boss system. In Aauto Quicker, two parallel hills are Suhua and Cheng Yixiao.
The predecessor of Aauto Quicker was led by Cheng Yixiao, and Suhua played a significant role in the process of growing into a short video social platform. This is a subtle entrepreneurial combination. The two people’s equity and voting rights are close. Ideally, they will share the same share, especially in the early stage. In fact, this model did have a honeymoon period of several years. Generally speaking, Suhua was responsible for investment and financing, commercialization, internationalization and functional departments, while Cheng Yixiao focused on product and technology business. However, if it is not handled properly, dual-core governance will easily lead to internal friction.
Before Aauto Quicker went public, there was some overlap in terms of authority between Su Cheng and Su Cheng. According to comprehensive media reports, it was once common to select sides and divide factions within Aauto Quicker. This has become a major problem criticized by the outside world in Aauto Quicker. It was not until Suhua stepped down as CEO and retreated from the front line of management to the position of chairman that this dual-core governance pattern changed.
In the past two years, Cheng Yixiao, who became the CEO of Aauto Quicker, gradually got used to this role. Before that, he was always considered to be inarticulate and not good at making public appearances. However, under the circumstance that Suhua made less and less public appearances, he assumed more responsibilities in this respect. And more like a comprehensive CEO.
In terms of performance, Cheng Yixiao’s leadership performance in the past two years has also been recognized. Aauto Quicker’s domestic business has been profitable for four consecutive quarters, and it achieved overall profitability at the group level for the first time in the first quarter of this year. Of course, there are also challenges, such as the pressure of growth and the pressure of stock price. When Aauto Quicker was first listed, its scenery was infinite and its market value was high, but now its total market value has shrunk by nearly 80%.
It is in this situation that Aauto Quicker’s "key person" changed from two to one, and the power was finally unified into Cheng Yixiao’s hands.
What awaits Suhua next may be a more leisurely life like a wild crane. After retiring, the Internet tycoons with financial freedom are usually less known to the outside world. Boss Ma is an exception. In April this year, Suhua registered and established a software information company, and maybe there will be other actions in the future. The cutting-edge technology that big bosses especially admire, I wonder if Suhua will make substantial progress.
Aauto Quicker, which belongs to him, has stirred up years, and many of them will become the past.
Original title: "Chairman Aauto Quicker quit"
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