(Yicai Global) July 9 -- Big Data services provider Beijing Papaya Mobile Technology has recently withdrawn its bid to list on the SSE STAR Market, the Science and Technology Innovation Board of the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

This marks the first time a company has pulled out of an initial public offering on the exchange in the three months since it began taking applications.

The SSE is terminating its review in accordance with its rules since Papaya has voluntarily retracted its submission, the bourse announced yesterday. The company was unable to reply to the exchange's satisfaction to various specific questions in two previous rounds of open inquiry sessions conducted pursuant to the listing procedure, per the announcement.

For example, the firm said its procurement made up 21 percent of Menlo Park, California-based Facebook's Asian revenues, but this was inconsistent with data measurement results the US social media giant filed with the Nasdaq Stock Market.

The bourse also questioned the advancement of Papaya's core technology, risks from its high dependence on cash from Facebook marketing and the inconsistency in business content disclosed in its listing application report and previous ones.

The issuer and relevant intermediary institutions are bound by law once the exchange accepts a listing application, the SSE stressed, adding information disclosure documents must be true and accurate. Termination of review does not mitigate an applicant's legal liability for failure to make truthful disclosure, it noted.

In contrast to the approval-based system for initial public offering adopted on China's main stock market boards, the new sci-tech innovation board, which will start trading on July 22, implements a registration-based IPO system, in which the SSE is only responsible for reviewing whether the information and materials provided by the applicant fulfill information disclosure obligations.

The new system streamlines the listing process but also sets a higher legal bar for the applicant's integrity.

Founded in 2008, Papaya's main business is providing domestic companies with overseas marketing services using global Big Data resources and processing and analysis technology, information on the company's website shows.

Editor: Ben Armour