Colin Huang founder of $170bn Pinduoduo quietly set up a web of ecommerce and gaming ventures in Shanghai.

On paper, a "white-glove" Gu Yanping, 69, from rural China owned many of the companies. Their offices in downtown Shanghai are completely unmarked

Current and former employees at the offices say they write code for shopping sites like Vova, Azazie, JJ's House, and many other popular discount sites

Employees say they were recruited by Leqee or Lebei (both connected to Colin) but are paid by another company Ms Gu set up Shanghai Mocan. No one knows why.

Mocan also registered the website http://Xinyoudi.com  , a gaming company Colin said he founded. (It seems it has been taken down since I took a screenshot of it)

Xinyoudi, as a company never existed. But the games on its website like Mafia City are created a couple of floors below Pinduoduo's offices at another company Ms Gu set up in 2018 Shanghai Youta 上海友塔网络 (Yotta Games)

Mr Huang's gaming companies have brought in almost $500m in the last twelve months. (It's a good time to be in the gaming business.) from Sensor Tower:

Their ads all over the internet have also come under scrutiny for their graphic and misogynistic content: https://www.theguardian.com/games/2018/aug/24/mafia-city-video-game-ad-does-not-breach-facebook-guidelines

So this is all in China. Outside of China, a bunch of Hong Kong shell companies most using the same HK company printer secretary (Rocky Shek Secretarial) have been set up to publish the games and run the ecommerce sites

I followed one of the paper trails: ZC Holding is the public facing company for Vova, Floryday and some of the games like Girls X Battle on Amazon. The shell company is owned outright by a man named Chen Yi, with an address in Shanghai

There is a better graphic in our story: https://www.ft.com/content/09e313c8-a1f7-4b49-9c2f-a287683512d1

At Chen Yi's registered address in Shanghai, his father Chen Naijian opened the door shirtless. He told me his son worked at Vova in the Greenland building where all these companies operate out of.

Chen Naijian, who is 66, also became the majority owner of Suzhou Lebei Network Technology (Lebbay) in 2018 when Pinduoduo's current CEO Chen Lei transferred his shares to him and another person for the cost of their paid-up capital.

Lebbay ran Pinduoduo's early site (拼好货)

Lebbay also booked 1/4 of PDD's sales in 2016.

Today Lebbay employees mostly seem to do customer service for Azazie and the other ecom sites out of Suzhou. No one knows why there are so many different companies

...After I visited the Greenland building and asked about 69-year-old Gu, she transferred her 90% stake in both Shanghai Mocan and Shanghai Youta to another man (who is also connected to PDD).

In 2014 Ms Gu also set up Shanghai Xunmeng, the company that is PDD today

In 2016 Ms Gu transferred her 90% stake in Xunmeng to the entity US investors now buy into. PDD told US investors Xunmeng was “controlled by the Founder (Mr Huang) since its establishment.”

Our more succinct story: https://www.ft.com/content/09e313c8-a1f7-4b49-9c2f-a287683512d1