(Yicai Global) Sept. 7 -- The head of Tencent-backed Ziroom Shunguo Asset Management, the under-fire owner of a long-term rentals platform, has apologized for the death of a tenant in an exclusive interview with Yicai Global.

"I'll not shirk our responsibility as a company and I sincerely apologize to those customers whose health suffered because they rented through us," Chief Executive Xiong Lin told Yicai Global in his first television interview since a Sept. 1 article accused the Beijing-based company of leasing out a flat with higher-than-normal levels of formaldehyde. The tenant later died of leukaemia.

Ziroom, which runs China's fourth-largest online residential leasing app, has delisted all of its first-time rental units to make way for testing which started this week.

"Some customers suffered health problems after living in our rented homes and we're working hard to deal with the issue," Xiong said.

"We're committed to ensuring that all Ziroom rentals from now must be proved safe via a CMA [China Metrology Accreditation] inspection," he said, adding that reports would be published online and no units would be available until given the all-clear.

An Alibaba employee surnamed Wang died of acute leukemia after living in a Ziroom flat for six months, WeChat-based media outlet Youyou Luming reported on Sept. 1. After he died, his family carried out tests on the apartment and found higher-than-normal levels of formaldehyde.

Ziroom faces a court hearing in Hangzhou set for Sept. 27. The company contacted the family immediately after the event, it said in a statement, adding that it would cooperate with the judiciary departments and respect court rulings.

Founded in 2011, Ziroom manages around half a million rooms across China and has provided services to more than 1.2 million renters to date. The company secured CNY4 billion (USD585 million) in A-round funding in January, led by Tencent Holdings, global private equity firm Warburg Pincus and Sequoia Capital.

Editor: William Clegg