BEIJING: China's would-be Starbucks rival Luckin Coffee has removed its co-founder and chairman after a scandal involving fake sales figures that resulted in the company being delisted from the US Nasdaq and the ouster of two top executives.

Luckin's billionaire founder Charles Zhengyao Lu has been replaced as chairman by Jinyi Guo, previously the acting CEO, the embattled coffee chain said in a statement on its website dated Monday.

Guo will also take over as CEO.

The announcement came days after company directors had voted to keep Lu on the board despite an internal investigation that found the company had inflated its 2019 sales revenue by some 2.12 billion yuan ($311 million).