So, who is this good-looking millennial CEO that fascinated the stock market and consumers’ wallets alike?

He aced at school

Born in Sichuan province in 1983, Chen received a scholarship to study at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University when he was just 16 years old. He then continued his education at Stanford University where he became the youngest Chinese person ever to receive an MBA, aged 26.

Jumei is not his first company

Jumei is not Chen’s first company, but his third. When he was at Nanyang, he co-founded an online gaming platform called Garena. Then after graduating from Stanford, he co-founded a venture with his two classmates called Reemake. The company was focused on running ad spots on online games. Both companies failed.

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It wasn’t until 2010 that Chen Ou found success. Not long after its launch, Jumei garnered a lot of attention from customers and investors as Chen, 31 at the time, became China’s youngest billionaire by 2014.

He is his own spokesperson

Jumei didn’t use a celebrity as its brand ambassador but featured the young, smart, good-looking CEO himself. With his “I'm my own ambassador” campaign, in a month, Chen’s followers on Weibo increased by 50 per cent.

Not only did this save the company millions in marketing but it also epitomised the company’s image of being young and visionary. Chen also appeared in TV shows to promote his products and himself.

Fake problems

In May 2014, Jumei decided to go public on the New York Stock Exchange – another landmark in Chen’s stellar career.

Not long after going public, Jumei faced a fake-goods scandal. Jumei’s business model relied on third parties to source its products. Once customers found fake goods circulating via its e-commerce platform, Jumei’s performance and stock price suffered greatly. Soon after, Chen started to retreat from social media.

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The delisting drama

With mounting problems at Jumei, in 2017 Chen announced that he would buy back all depository shares, priced at US$7, at once removing his company from the NYSE, when the retailer’s issuance price was US$22.

In early 2020, however, Chen retracted his 2017 announcement and said he would in fact buy back the depository shares at US$20. Investors welcomed the news as the stock was priced around US$17 at the time.

Other business adventures

Even before Jumei went private, Chen seemed to have his own plan for expanding his business. He decided to invest a total of US$59 million in power bank rental startup AnkerBox and a Chinese TV drama. At the time, investors questioned his decision, but now it seems he made the right call.

Media reported that in 2018, the power bank start-up made an annual profit for the first time. The revenue from the startup made up 21 per cent of Jumei’s total revenue that year, despite the fact Jumei only owns three per cent of the startup’s stocks.

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