Wang Xing

Wang Xing was born in 1979 in Longyan, Fujian, China.[3] He graduated from Tsinghua University with a bachelor’s degree in electronic engineering in 2001. He pursued a Ph.D. in computer engineering at University of Delaware from 2001 to 2004 but then dropped out of the program.[4] Nevertheless, in 2005, he received a master's degree in computer engineering from University of Delaware.[1]

After dropping out of University of Delaware, Wang returned to China and, with a couple of friends, tried to create a Chinese version of the then-social networking site Friendster.[5] His first such site was called Duoduoyou ("Many Friends"), targeting students in various Chinese universities. Unfortunately, Duoduoyou failed to take off. He then started Youzitu to serve Chinese students abroad but the site got shut down.[3]

In 2005, he created a Chinese version of Facebook called Xiaonei ("On Campus"). The site was a hit but Wang had to sell it off due to financial problems. The new owners re-branded the site, which is now called Renren ("Everybody").[5]

In 2007, he created a Chinese version of Twitter called Fanfou.[5] It was China's first big microblogging site but was soon shut down by the government over politically sensitive content. It was eventually permitted to reopen but by then, other Chinese microblogging sites like Sina Weibo and Tencent Weibo had entered the market and captured substantial market share.[6]

In 2010, he founded the Chinese group-buying site Meituan, which was based on the business model of Groupon.[5] Meituan was hugely successful and merged with Dianping in 2015 to become Meituan-Dianping.[7]