Sad news for technology watchers during the Golden Week holiday: tech startup and former editor Zhang Rui has passed away.
Zhang was ironically co-founder of Chinese healthcare mobile app Spring Rain Doctors, and previously an editor at Netease and a Beijing newspaper.
The Beijing-based mobile healthcare app maker backed by China International Capital Corporation Limited and other investors just completed a RMB1.2 billion pre-IPO round and is preparing for an initial public offering.
Entrepreneurs have expressed shock on Weibo and WeChat in the past two days as the sad news spread of his heart attack.
Spring Rain Doctors has 29 million active users and is one of the largest healthcare mobile apps in China.
Zhang Rui reportedly did not want to pursue an IPO, but yielded to investor pressure and agreed to spin out the company's online consultation business and potentially list it via a reverse merger with an A-share company.
Spring Rain Doctors, or Chunyu Yisheng in Chinese, saw its online consultation business recording revenues of RMB130 million in 2015 with a profit of RMB30 million, according to previous media reports.