BEIJING - The founder of China's smartphone
maker Smartisan Technology has been barred from taking flights
and high-speed railway trains due to the company's failure to
comply with court rulings from a contractual dispute, a local
court document showed.
Smartisan is a niche player in China's smartphone sector and
is best known for its flamboyant founder Luo Yonghao, who made
headlines in recent years with bold statements including a claim
that he was planning to acquire Apple.
Luo is also barred from spending at higher quality hotels,
night clubs and golf clubs, buying properties and high-premium
insurance and sending his children to expensive private schools,
under an order issued by the court of Danyang in eastern China.
The order was issued after the court found the company
failed to comply with previous court rulings from a contractual
dispute with a local electronic firm, the document said.
Smartisan's smartphone sales in China lag behind players
like Huawei, Xiaomi and Oppo. Chinese social
media firm ByteDance earlier this year said it was developing a
phone with Smartisan after acquiring a set of patents from it.
Luo, CEO and founder of Chinese smartphone startup Smartisan, introduces a new instant messaging app Bullet Messenger in Beijing
Smartisan launched a new phone on Thursday. In a video
posted on its official Weibo account, Smartisan Chief Operating
Officer Wu Dezhou said that most of the Smartisan team had moved
to ByteDance following the deal to work on smartphones and
education hardware, but that Luo had left the team due to
personal reasons.
Luo, in a statement posted on the twitter-like social media
platform Weibo, apologised to his creditors and investors, and
promised to pay off all of his debt in the future.
The company used to owe as much as 600 million yuan as
business deteriorated since last year, but managed to return 300
million yuan during the past 10 months, said Luo.