HNA’s Co-Chairman, Wang Jian, Dies in Fall, Company Says

The co-chairman and co-founder of HNA Group, a Chinese conglomerate that spent heavily in recent years to build a global profile but has since grappled with high debt, died from an accidental fall in France, the company said on Wednesday.

Wang Jian, 57, was on a business trip in Provence but had taken a detour on Tuesday to go sightseeing when the fall happened, according to HNA and the French police. The police said they were treating his death as a likely accident.

Mr. Wang was visiting Bonnieux, a traditional village with a church atop a rocky outcropping, when the fall occurred on Tuesday morning.

“He wanted to have his picture taken by someone in his group,” Col. Hubert Mériaux, of the Vaucluse gendarmerie force, said in a telephone interview. As he climbed onto a low wall with a view of the local landscape “he fell backwards, 10 to 15 meters further below,” Col. Mériaux said.

Col. Mériaux said an investigation into the death was still ongoing but that the police had no immediate suspicions of foul play.

Mr. Wang was with HNA employees at the time of his death, said Israel Hernandez, a spokesman for HNA who had accompanied Mr. Wang on his trip to France. “They were unable to grab him,” Mr. Hernandez said.

Chen Feng, HNA’s other co-chairman, Adam Tan, its chief executive, and Mr. Wang’s family were en route to France. The Chinese website of Hainan Airlines, one of HNA’s main businesses, was rendered gray instead of its usual reddish color scheme in honor of Mr. Wang’s death.

Mr. Wang’s death comes as the company continues to try to get a handle on its finances.

HNA spent tens of billions of dollars in recent years buying up financial firms, hotels, real estate and other investments around the world. It also bought Ingram Micro, an American technology distributor, two years ago for $6 billion, and it took big stakes in major companies like Hilton Hotels and Deutsche Bank.

Mr. Wang played a key role in the company’s rise from a regional, state-controlled company to a vast conglomerate. His brother, Wang Wei, also played a major role, although much of his work was behind the scenes.

But the company’s spending spree left it $90 billion in debt at a difficult time. Last year, Chinese officials began casting a skeptical eye on Chinese companies that were buying billions in global assets with marquee names but little strategic value. In China, HNA was commonly lumped in with companies that the official news media called gray rhinos — large and visible problems that nevertheless go unnoticed until they begin moving too fast to stop.

Though the company has since struck deals to sell billions of dollars worth of assets, it is still showing signs of financial strain. Just this week, an Australian company said its proposed sale of its refrigerated logistics business to HNA fell through in part because of the Chinese company’s cash problems.

HNA has also contended with questions over who controls the company. Last year it said its largest shareholder, a mysterious businessman named Guan Jun, transferred his stake to a charitable trust. Regulators in the United States, Switzerland, Germany and New Zealand have asked HNA for more clarity.