Zhuosheng Micro (300782.SZ), a leading domestic maker of radio‑frequency front‑end chips, disclosed that one of its controlling shareholders and chairman, Xu Zhihan, has divorced and will transfer roughly half of his directly held shares to his ex‑wife, Zhang Yu. The stake Zhang will receive is valued at about Rmb1.29 billion (≈US$190 million) and amounts to 17.152 million shares — roughly half of Xu’s current direct holding and about 3.2% of the company’s total equity.
The announcement, issued late on February 11, also set limits on future disposals: Zhang may sell no more than 10% of her holdings each year, while she pledged that during any period Xu serves as a director or senior manager her annual transfers would not exceed 25% of her holdings. Before the transfer, Xu directly owned 34.304 million tradable shares, equal to 6.41% of the company; Zhang held no shares.
The timing sharpens investor unease. The disclosure follows a rare earnings warning from Zhuosheng Micro: the company now expects 2025 revenue of Rmb3.7–3.75 billion, a decline of 16–18%, and a net loss attributable to shareholders of Rmb255–295 million — its first annual loss since listing in 2019. Fourth‑quarter results appear to have deteriorated most sharply, with quarterly revenue down and a widening quarterly loss.
This is the second high‑profile divorce to reshape ownership at Zhuosheng Micro. In mid‑2023 a different controlling shareholder, Tang Zhuang, transferred roughly 32.76 million shares to his ex‑spouse under a divorce settlement — a move then valued at about Rmb3.41 billion — and altered the company’s top‑shareholder register. Such transfers have precedent in China’s founder‑ and family‑dominated technology firms and routinely attract market scrutiny because they change the identity of beneficial owners without corporate action.
For investors the immediate issue is liquidity and signalling. Although the shares handed to Zhang will not make her a >5% holder, the creation of a new, potentially monetisable block of tradable stock at a time of worsening fundamentals raises the risk of incremental selling pressure. The formal caps on annual disposals moderate that risk but are time‑limited and contractual rather than statutory; they do not eliminate the possibility of staged sales or subsequent transfers to other parties.
Beyond market mechanics, the episode spotlights corporate governance questions in China’s chip sector. Founder and family arrangements remain a common mechanism for control; divorce settlements that reallocate shareholdings can alter governance dynamics, complicate succession planning and prompt fresh disclosure obligations. Regulators and investors are attentive to changes in the composition of controlling shareholders and to any signals they send about management stability at technology firms facing profit pressure.
For Zhuosheng Micro the immediate priorities will be to steady operations amid a cyclical downturn in demand for RF components, reassure investors about management continuity and clarify whether the new shareholder will remain passive. The company faces a test familiar to many mid‑cap Chinese chip suppliers: shrinking near‑term margins and revenues while navigating concentrated ownership and the attendant political, legal and market risks of transfers among insiders.