A Visit To Huawei, China's Secretive Tech Giant (VIDEO)

Huawei Technologies is one of the world's fastest growing telecom-hardware makers, and yet much of the company is shrouded in secrecy. Fortunately, thanks to BBC reporter Nick Mackie who was allowed a rare glimpse inside the inner-workings of Huawei, we now know a little more about China's enigmatic tech giant.

Based in Shenzhen, southern China, Huawei's telecom systems currently connect one third of the world's mobile phones, and the company employs a global staff of 110,000 workers -- more than Microsoft or Cisco.

At first glance, the casually-dressed employees walking around on Huawei's corporate campus at lunchtime appears to be a scene more commonly found in Silicon Valley. "It's a very young company, it's less than 20 years old," Ross Gan, global head of Huawei Technologies' corporate communications, told the BBC. "Our workforce is also very young -- the average age is 29 -- so there's a very dynamic environment within the company."

In 2010, Huawei's revenue was $28 billion and according to Gan, the company expects to grow to over $100 billion in annual revenue within ten years. In comparison, Apple is expected to surpass $100 billion in annual revenue for the first time this year. Microsoft's annual revenue in 2010 was over $62 billion.

Huawei's booming growth is representational of Asia's increasing stronghold on the manufacturing industry, and more specifically the consumer side of selling mobile devices. In the first quarter of 2011, Huawei sold 7 million mobile devices and expects to ship 60 million mobile phones (20 million of which will likely be Android smartphones) by the end of this year. Apple sold 20 million iPhones in the most recent quarter.

While many Americans probably haven't heard of Huawei yet, the brand may soon become a household name in the states. Victor Xu, chief marketing officer for Huawei's device business, told The Wall Street Journal that Huawei is considering a multi-million dollar marketing budget in the U.S. for next year.

Despite Huawei's impressive growth, many U.S. lawmakers are concerned about the company's alleged close ties with China's military, notes ZDNet. In the wake of recent cyber attacks on the International Monetary Fund, which investigators now believe was a China-based attack, according to Bloomberg, officials want to be certain that Huawei's technology isn't behind hacking threats.

“We believe that the misconceptions stem from media and political parties,” Dr Song Liuping, Huawei’s chief legal officer, told the Telegraph. “Huawei is taking an open and transparent attitude to address the concerns of the US government. In fact, we have been making all efforts to address their concerns and questions.”

Comments

[markIDGCONNECT]

08:03 AM on 08/02/2011

Anyone who is clutching on to the illusion that the US will always be the dominant super power only has to look back in history and see the cyclical nature of empires.

Mark at http://www.idgconnect.com/blog

[keiserz]

06:52 AM on 08/04/2011

FLAGGED
'As Abusive link below the comment'.It's in Q/A rules.
Also, "(V) This community is a safe space.". "If you see any threats, harassment or personal information trolling please report it quickly."
Personal information.

[Mister Grumpy]

11:04 PM on 07/31/2011

The next time you use your chinese manufactured electronic product.......... keep saying to yourself........

China is our friend....... China is our friend.......... China is our friend............

And then promptly enter yourself in a mental hospital..............

[mike72]

12:44 AM on 08/01/2011

China is not our friend. We are just their customers, one of the many of their customers on this planet.

Have you ever asked your corner groccery store owner, "are you my friend?" before buying stuff? You are doing a business transaction that you believe what you paid is worth what you got out of the deal.

NOTHING MORE!

Yet somehow you have that victim's mentality that when you are NOT IN THE CONTROL of business transaction, you are resorting to emotional frustration. Snap out of it. BUILD SOMETHING that Chinese want and maybe you can sell something you built to the Chinese.

But of course, that is too MUCH WORK. It is better to just print some fiat money and buy it from the Chinese.

[frank day]

11:50 AM on 08/01/2011

Says the original .50 center.

[mike72]

09:04 PM on 08/01/2011

Dear Frank the FLG Cultist,

How is your day so far? Have something intelligent to say? :)

-- Mike

[bccmeteorites]

10:26 AM on 08/02/2011

What about U.S. products made in China?

[mike72]

08:42 PM on 07/31/2011

I kept looking at those yougn, brillian, and hopeful faces in this video and could not stop wondering, "that was exactly how we Americans felt about ourselves, with emphasis on science and solid hard work, only 30 or 40 years ago. And what has happened 40 years ago, what is the turning point, that turned we Americans into a group of whining sissy who do not even realize we are nothing but a group of "consumer oriented" whining sissy?"

What happened to this once great country? What force (maybe ourselves is the only force?) was at play that turned this country to this state of pathetic existence?

[RidgeDog]

10:07 AM on 08/01/2011

What happened? We stopped manufacturing products and began to outsource all of that manufacturing to those happy faces in China and elsewhere. This has now made us nothing more than consumer-slaves to the Chinese. Until we start BUILDING in our country again, we can expect to continue losing jobs and our economic place in the world.

[mike72]

09:07 PM on 08/01/2011

But when? What? Who? It doesn't just happen. It must be a coordinated efforts in multiple levels to gut our industry bases out.

I hope there is a writer who can put the faces and names to this most disgusting episode of US history.

[bccmeteorites]

09:50 AM on 08/02/2011

Haven't you heard. We have so much R&D and manufacturing we are farming out most of the work to legal and illegal immigrants.

[mike72]

06:15 PM on 07/31/2011

The only way to prevent cash loaded Chinese companies from buying US tech companies is by always accusing them as proxies of Chinese government and its military.

[Christopher Hull]

02:05 PM on 07/31/2011

I think some of my fellow HuffPo's miss the real point of this story.
Yes ALL companies employ some security. From something as simple as a passord to get into a mom and pop's Quickbooks at the corner market to the security details many of you described.
What makes this company a threat is that it is ABSOLUTELY part of the Chinese military. AND we "smart" Americans handed them the technology and the factories while doing nothing to protect our mostly tax payer funded development of those technologies. Talk about a transfer of wealth!
I don't blame the Chinese at all btw. They are doing what they percieve to be in their economys best interest. I just wish we had a few people in Washington who were as concerned about ours.

[Arts4u]

03:55 PM on 07/31/2011

Yes, our nations finest seem very intent on giving away just about all of the few advantages the US has left..... fries with that burger?

[alexunlv]

01:08 PM on 07/31/2011

We are done with!

We just have a bunch of teabaggers who are preventing Uncle Sam from increasing the debt ceiling to keep up with the competition.

Done!

[knewsreply]

12:33 PM on 07/31/2011

Isn't it time to pay a little more and keep our American inventions out of the hands of the Chinese, who copy them and resale them? Haven't the US taxpayers paid enough to subsidies or give tax benefits to companies, who take their profits to invest in manufacturing plants in China, India, etc. or buy parts from China that are copies of products made in the USA? What do we do to bring the manufacturing back to the USA? Is it true that now GE is building and Nuclear Plant in China - thats another story, but isn't China a bigger concern than Iran? Sorry too many questions.

[x4r1]

12:31 PM on 08/02/2011

China has had nukes since the 60's so lulz to you

[knewsreply]

01:47 PM on 08/02/2011

Who said anything about nukes? China copies, duplicates and sells items for less money. After GE completes their Nucular Plant in China, China will copy it and start selling plants in the world for less in 5 to 10 years. The same as they do everything else. They aren't good at original thought, but they are great of copying. And they won't even thank GE.

[jo smith456]

08:23 AM on 07/31/2011

WHAT's the BIG DEAL?

Intel, IBM, HP, BOEING, APPLE, Federal Reserve,Coca-Cola --- no one is allowed to view places in their companies, where their company secrets are discussed or used.

[ConcernedCitizen78]

11:39 PM on 07/30/2011

"A Visit To Huawei, China's SECRETIVE Tech Giant ....and yet much of the company is shrouded in SECRECY" [emphasis added].

Day in, day out, I love all these headlines and leading sentences that portray China or anything Chinese as secretive, diabolical, sinister, demonic, untrustworthy, quarrelsome, aggressive, etc.

If you visit Cisco, Microsoft, IBM, Alcatel-Lucent, or any of the high-tech companies, they will openly and freely give you a tour and presentation of all their design, manufacturing, testing, marketing and sales departments, facilities, strategies and techniques!

Only a Chinese high-tech company is "shrouded in secrecy"! These inscrutable Chinese! They are so unlike us! How can we ever get along with them? How can anyone expect us to ever treat them as equals, human beings?

[DAE]

11:52 PM on 07/30/2011

One of my kids works at a unit of Microsoft. There is a receptionist in the lobby you have to register with and then he calls ahead to see if the party you want to see is available. Then your party comes out to greet you. Only then can you enter the premises accompanied by who you're visiting. I'm sure that's how all high tech firms work. Its not any sort of cloak and dagger scenario its just business as usual. Here. In China its all so secretive.

[ConcernedCitizen78]

12:17 AM on 07/31/2011

I had worked for almost 15 years in the leading computer company in the US. We had a 'clean-desk policy' where not a scrap of business correspondence, note, memo, even manuals, etc must be left out on your desk when you leave the office; everything had to be locked away in your credenza.

Periodically, the security officers conduct SURPRISE sweeps of all the work desks late at night, including looking into your waste basket beside your desk. Anything that is not shredded and has a legible name of a business person, customer, product info, etc was a security infringement. You and everyone else would know you had violated the company's security because of the BIG RED STICKER over your desk when you arrived for work next morning! You were then hauled into your manager's office to please explain. Three strikes and YOU ARE OUT!

And there were many, many security procedures. We do it - it's security. If the Chinese do it - it's SECRECY! The subtle drip, drip, drip continues.

That American high-tech companies have several very individualistic and iconic personalities, like Bill Gates, John Chambers, Lou Gerstner, etc and no equivalent high-profile personalities in the Chinese world does not help. But that doesn't mean they are secretive. By nature, they are more group-oriented than individualistic; they are more accustomed to being "the wind beneath the wings", the ones that “never see sunlight on their faces”, but that doesn't make them or their companies more ‘secretive’!

[ConcernedCitizen78]

12:34 AM on 07/31/2011

BTW, I'm very familiar with your son's company procedures.

In fact, in ours, the visitor had to have an ID badge worn visibly (we ensured that by pinning on the ID badge ourselves and not leaving to chance that the visitor will wear it visibly) and escorted (the word is not 'accompanied') at all times. Meetings must be held in certain conference rooms only. Someone must always be with the visitor, even to the washroom (you volunteer as a "courtesy" to "show" them where it is) and he/she never allowed to wander freely. Any non-observances of these procedures is a security infringement by you, a blight on your career record. Yes, we were almost paranoid about 'security'.

[La Luna]

02:16 PM on 07/31/2011

sarcasm？

[MarkInEugene]

11:37 PM on 07/30/2011

It's wonderful to see any country excel. Of course this creates competition for US corporations, but it also creates a high level of sophistication in the Chinese culture. China's success is good for humanity because we need excellence and competition globally.

Yes, there are many problems: wage pressure; environmental concerns, and employment come to mind. But China is generating a lot more than mere consumer goods. It's also generating huge education centers, intellectual curiosity, increased consciousness and understanding of markets, technology, human psychology and global partnerships. This will inevitably place pressure on the countries power centers forcing a closer look at human rights and quality of life issues.

When I look at the abuses in our system of government and what is going on in Washington today, I find it more difficult to criticize China's form of government. I'm not advocating for it because I'm sure it has problems. But now that America, instead of being "by the people and for the people" has become "by the people and for Grover Norquist", I really feel like we have no place to criticize the prospering and modernizing Chinese.

[bccmeteorites]

10:30 AM on 08/02/2011

If you call stealing and pirating everything in sight competition, then I see why our ship is sinking.

[Lordcron]

07:32 PM on 07/30/2011

It's really feeling like a matter of when these tech companies overtake American tech companies, not a matter of if.

[nuited]

06:06 PM on 07/30/2011

Great to be employed and the spyware is free.

[mochaview]

06:05 PM on 07/30/2011

We can bring them all to their knees by boycotting every foreign made piece of equipment. They cannot undermine the will of a determined people when we are just simply tired of this nonsense where we're good enough to buy this stuff but not good enough to make it right here in the USA. Well, when there's no more money to buy any of it and nowhere in our tent cities to use them it will be another story then.

[DAE]

10:40 PM on 07/30/2011

They don't even sell in the US yet. I think they can do just fine without you.

[bccmeteorites]

10:31 AM on 08/02/2011

Aren't many Apple products made in China?

[ConcernedCitizen78]

09:41 AM on 07/31/2011

And if they ever set up shop in the US, we can also "bring them all to their knees" by boycotting any jobs they offer. It is rumored they may be building high-speed rail in the US and buying businesses in the US. We should all refuse to be employed by them too! That will really skew them!

And no American should ever accept any job offered by China businesses, with its "abysmal record of human rights, and openness" and its "long history of stealing technology from competitor­s and then rolling it out as its own". They had been stealing ideas long before the US came into existence! Chinese are INCAPABLE of any original thoughts and innovation!

For a start, let's all boycott WalMart! Yay!

[musterseeds]

04:43 PM on 07/30/2011

Thank to good old USA just keep on made China rich. Chine need taxes break from GOPTEABEGGER.

[DAE]

10:42 PM on 07/30/2011

ROFL. The Chinese made themselves rich. We're making ourselves poor. And who's to blame? YOU.

[Arts4u]

03:59 PM on 07/31/2011

Corporations & shareholders. The endless pursuit of the bottom line.

[Tom95134]

02:19 PM on 07/30/2011

If they want to sell product here then let them establish manufacturing here. It is what American companies have to do when they want to do business in China.

[rojcar]

10:12 PM on 07/30/2011

That is the wisest suggestion I have heard in a long time!! Good call.

[DAE]

10:44 PM on 07/30/2011

Don't worry. When it costs more to manufacture in China than here they'll do just that. And given the state of our economy that will be sooner than later.

[rojcar]

01:57 AM on 07/31/2011

Probably true... we have made many bad decisions and have not protected our own interests.