Meet Colin Huang, who just stepped down as CEO of $100 billion Pinduoduo and whose wealth exploded by $25 billion in 2020

Lu-Hai LiangJul 3, 2020, 14:33 IST

Colin Huang, Pinduoduo founder.Visual China Group/Getty Images

Colin Huang, the 40-year-old founder of ecommerce giant Pinduoduo, is currently China's third-richest person.
Huang on July 1 stepped down as chief executive of Pinduoduo, which has managed to rack up a market cap of more than $100 billion in less than five years.
Pinduoduo is a gamified online marketplace that connects buyers and sellers and has a market value of $101 billion — more than Uber or Sony. Huang, who owns 29.4% of the company, is currently worth more than $40 billion.
Huang's first full-time job was at Google. He resigned in 2007, and has since been a serial entrepreneur.

Colin Huang isn't a household name outside of China, but he's a serious challenger to Alibaba founder Jack Ma and Tencent founder and CEO Pony Ma for the title of China's richest man.

Huang has just stepped down as the chief executive of Pinduoduo, a gamified online marketplace connecting buyers and sellers. It's popular in China and has a market cap of more than $100 billion, giving it a higher valuation than Uber or Sony.

People buy items on Pinduoduo such as iPhones at sale price while playing games, and rope in friends to "group-buy" groceries at huge discounts. Pinduoduo takes a small commission and charges sellers to promote their products on its app, but doesn't hold any stock.

Huang, 40, founded the company in 2015. It's grown rapidly ever since, and listed in July 2018.

Huang's fortune has exploded since. His net worth is up by $25 billion in 2020, and shares in Pinduoduo climbed to an all-time high of $87.58 on the Nasdaq on June 19.

On June 21, Forbes' Real-Time Billionaire Index showed Huang, worth $45.4 billion, briefly surpassing Alibaba's Jack Ma, worth $43.9 billion, to become China's second-richest man after Tencent's Pony Ma. Huang soon slipped back into third place and currently he is 23rd on the global Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Keep reading to learn more about the life of Pinduoduo billionaire Colin Huang.

Huang came from humble beginnings, and a math Olympiad changed his life

Pinduoduo founder Colin Huang. Visual China Group/Getty Images

In the late 1990s, Huang was one of relatively few young Chinese people with internet access and international friends

Zhejiang University, where Huang studied computer science. dowell/Getty Images

But Huang has one big regret about his youth

Colin Huang, pictured at Pinduoduo's Nasdaq listing party in 2018. Visual China Group/Getty Images

He interned at Microsoft, but wasn't tempted by a future at the Redmond giant

Huang interned at Microsoft's Redmond, Washington, base. Ted S. Warren/AP

Huang's first full-time job was at Google, which he described as a lucky break

Huang was part of Google's Beijing landing team. Reuters

Huang compares Google's local influence to China's liberalizing 1980s reforms

Colin Huang, Pinduoduo founder, in 2018. Visual China Group/Getty Images

Huang gained "basic financial freedom" at Google — then went his own way

Colin Huang speaking in 2018. Visual China Group/Getty Images

Huang wants Pinduoduo to be a mash-up of Costco and Disneyland

Pinduoduo's Shanghai base. Reuters

The billionaire has been influenced by Buddhism, and once travelled to Taiwan to visit a famous Buddhist pilgrimage site

Huang has visited Fo Guang Shan monastery, in Taiwan, and takes inspiration from Buddhism. Jeremy Horner/Getty Images

He didn't attend the Wall Street opening bell for his company's Nasdaq IPO

Colin Huang at Pinduoduo's listing party in Shanghai, 2018. Visual China Group/Getty Images

His company is perhaps the biggest in the world to have never made a quarterly profit

Pinduoduo's logo. SOPA Images/Getty Images

Huang stepped down as chief executive on July 1, 2020

The Pinduoduo app SOPA Images / Contributor / Getty Images

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