Billionaire company chief Xu Yusho held for alleged railway bribery

The billionaire chief a Shenzhen-listed technology company has been detained for bribery connected to the railways sector.

Invengo Information Technology president Xu Yusho, who is also a member of the Shenzhen Municipal People's Congress, was taken into custody by Shenzhen authorities after a request from the Zhengzhou Railway Bureau in Henan province, prosecutors said late on Monday.

Xu, 47, ranked in the top 500 of the Hurun Rich List in 2009, with 2.2 billion yuan (HK$2.7 billion) in assets.

Invengo is one of two providers of radio frequency identification tags and readers for the Railways Ministry. The company derived more than half of its revenue from railway contracts in 2010.

Prosecutors, who made the announcement on their official microblog, said the congress' Standing Committee approved Xu's detention on Wednesday.

Invengo yesterday said only that the company's business operations would not be affected and declined further comment on the investigation.

The company said its management had not been in touch with Xu since Wednesday.

Neither Shenzhen prosecutors nor the Municipal People's Congress could be reached for comment.

Numerous railways officials have been detained as part of a sweeping series of corruption investigations since the downfall of former railways minister Liu Zhijun early last year.

Xu and Invengo have had particularly close ties to the Railways Ministry, The Southern Metropolis News reported. Independent Invengo board member Ju Jiaxing , 69, served as the ministry's deputy director of science and technology from the late 1990s until his retirement 2004.

Ju is believed to have retained influence in the ministry, doing work for its high-speed-railways office and serving on a specialist team for the Beijing-Shanghai High-Speed Railway, according to the Daily Sunshine.