HNA co-chairman Wang Jian dies in France aged 57

Bloomberg

HNA Group Co., the once-acquisitive Chinese conglomerate that’s been selling billions of dollars in assets this year amid soaring borrowing costs, said that Co-chairman Wang Jian died after an accident in Provence, France. He was 57.
Wang, who was on a business trip, had a fall from which he couldn’t recover, HNA said in a statement on its website. Wang died on July 3 after falling from a 15-metre high cliff while having his photograph taken in Bonnieux, according to a police officer. The death isn’t being viewed as suspicious, the officer said.
Wang’s sudden death comes at a time when the group, one of China’s most indebted companies, was showing signs of putting its biggest problems behind it. “Wang’s passing will mark the end of an era of aggressive expansion by HNA,” said Corrine Png, CEO at Crucial Perspective Pte.