Dong Mingzhu and Lei Jun are spotted in non-adjacent seats during the meeting on Wednesday. [Photo/Economic Daily]

Changed seats raise bet speculation

Dong Mingzhu, the chairwoman and president of Green Electric Appliances Inc, a domestic home appliances manufacturer, was assigned a seat besides Lei Jun, chairman of Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi, during the CPPCC opening session on Tuesday afternoon.

However, they didn't sit together or talk during or after the meeting, rousing public speculations about a well-known bet the two had about their respective companies' earnings.

According to the highly-publicized bet, Lei Jun challenged Dong Mingzhu to beat Green's turnover in five years during an awards ceremony in 2013 saying if it doesn't, he will lose one yuan to her. Dong immediately raised the bet to ten billion.

Dong was asked if the bet is still on and she replied, "Lei Jun launched his new business in home decoration (rather than focusing on the smartphone business), so you should ask him if the bet is still valid."