Sinovac Biotech Ltd. said that third parties, including a group of dissident shareholders, had "misrepresented" the results of the company's annual general meeting and the composition of the board in a release issued March 14.
The news release from the group of "newly-elected directors," had said that Weidong Yin has been removed as the CEO of the company and four new board members were elected at the company's Feb. 6 annual general meeting held in Beijing.
A "quorum" had voted against the re-election of four sitting board members — Weidong Yin, Simon Anderson, Kenneth Lee and Meng Mei; elected four new members; and re-elected one sitting board member, Yuk Lam Lo, the release from the group said. Yin was "not qualified to serve as the CEO" because a Beijing court had ruled he had bribed a China Food and Drug Administration official, it added.
Responding to the release, Sinovac said the "dissident shareholder" group had sought to disrupt the annual board meeting and had no authority to "determine or announce the results."
It further added that the four sitting board members who were removed remain on the board as they were "properly re-elected at the AGM by a majority of the votes validly cast."
Two court cases have also been filed against the dissident shareholders. The Nasdaq-listed biopharmaceutical company said in a March 5 release that it was filing lawsuits in the Delaware Court of Chancery and in the U.S. District Court for Massachusetts against the dissident shareholders for "violating U.S. securities law."
The dissident shareholders in their press statement had said the directors were "not authorized" to start the lawsuits and they were considering "options and legal remedies" to respond.
Sinovac Biotech is a China-based biopharmaceutical company focusing on vaccines for various infectious diseases such as various strains of influenza, including H5N1, hepatitis and mumps. The company is listed on the Nasdaq.
