Cheng Wei all assets of the Chinese division of Uber, including its brand, business operations and data for operation within mainland China. Under the terms of the deal, Wei is set to become a board member of Uber and Uber's CEO also gets a seat on DiDi's board. Since the company was founded in 2012, under the leadership of Cheng Wei and Jean Liu, DiDi has grown to become one of the world’s highest valued tech start-ups. The company has evolved from a simple taxi-hailing app to taxi hailing, private car hailing, hitch (social ride-sharing), bus, minibus, chauffeur service, car rental service,
Scruff (app) and transgender community. In 2014, the company won several mobile app awards including "Time Out" New York’s Best App Award. In 2014, the company launched BenevolAds, which gives $1 million of free in-app advertising, annually, to LGBTQ community nonprofits, sports teams, public health organizations and community partners. The program also works with AIDS organizations, health agencies, and the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention to educate users about HIV and other diseases and to encourage testing. In 2015, the company added a traveler alert feature that notifies users when they reach one of approximately 100 countries where homosexuality is criminalized,