Ren Zhengfei

Parents

Ren's grandfather came from Jiangsu and was engaged in the manufacture of ham in neighboring Zhejiang . His son, Ren Mosyun ( Chinese trad. 任 摩 逊 ), studied economics in the 30s ^[4] , but did not finish his education at the university due to the death of his father. During the Japanese occupation, he migrated south to Guangzhou to work as an accountant at the Kuomintang government military factory. After that, he worked as a teacher in a school, where he met the future mother of Ren Zhengfei - Cheng Yuanzhao ^[4] , also a school teacher. After the proclamation of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, Ren Mosun was appointed head of Duyun Secondary School No. 1 ( Chinese trad. 都匀 一 中 ) ^[5] .

The early years

Ren Zhengfei was born on October 25, 1944 in a remote mountain town in Guizhou Province. He attended elementary school in a small district called Zhenning. Later, his parents moved to another small town, Duyun, where he graduated from high school ^[6] . In elementary and high school, Ren was reputed to be reserved and uncommunicative, and he was denied admission to the Komsomol because of the insufficiently developed spirit of collectivism ^[4] .

In 1963, Ren left Guizhou to study at the Institute of Civil Engineering and Architecture in Chongqing ^[7] . After graduating from the institute during the Chinese Cultural Revolution , he did not go to work, but began to independently study electronics from the textbooks of the Workers' University of Shanghai. Later, in 1974, he enrolled in courses at Xi'an Jiaotong University . During this time, he attended a lecture by Wu Jikang , a computer pioneer in China and one of the few Chinese scientists who visited the United States. During the lecture it was explained what a computer is and how it can be used in management. According to the confession of Ren Zhengfei himself, he did not understand a word from the two-hour lecture, but it fueled his interest in computer technology ^[6] .

Army Career

In 1974, Ren Zhengfei enlisted in the Civil Engineering Troops and participated in the construction of a chemical fiber plant in Liaoyang ^[7] . According to Jen himself, his entry into the army was largely random. At this time, China experienced an acute shortage of synthetic fabrics and the government decided to build a factory for their production in northern China using French equipment. Since no one was willing to work in this place, the construction was entrusted to the army, which attracted graduates of Chinese universities to install equipment ^[6] . Later, already as a military engineer, Ren joined the Information Technology Division of the Research Institute of the People's Liberation Army of China (PLA) ^[8] . For his success in the service, he was chosen as a delegate from the PLA to participate in the National Scientific Conference in 1978, as well as the XII Congress of the Chinese Communist Party in 1982. After the dissolution of the Civil Engineering Troops in 1983 and a massive reduction in the number of PLA, Affecting about 500,000 people, Ren Zhengfei resigned. At the time of dismissal from the army, his position corresponded to the deputy regiment commander, but without the assignment of a military rank ^[7] .

Creating Huawei

In 1983, already as a civilian, Ren moved to Shenzhen and worked on the basis of the logistics of the South Sea Oil Corporation ^[7] . In 1987, the Shenzhen Municipal Administration issued Decree No. 18, which allows individuals to create private high-tech companies ^[6] . In the same year, Ren Zhengfei, at the age of 43, created Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd , originally engaged in small wholesale supply of telecommunications equipment from Hong Kong. The starting capital of the company was 21,000 yuan , which at that time was approximately 5,000 US dollars. The minimum registered capital required by Shenzhen Municipality to register a private company was 20,000 yuan. In addition, at least five co-shareholders were required. Given this requirement, as well as the fact that Ren Zhengfei himself had only 3,000 yuan, he had to attract five partners to create the company ^[4] .

To date, Huawei has become one of the largest telecommunications companies in the world, whose annual income in 2017 amounted to $ 92.5 billion ^[9] , and annual investment in research and development reached $ 13.8 billion.

In 1988, Ren Zhengfei became the CEO of Huawei and still holds this position ^[7] . Now he is the deputy head of the board of directors, but does not participate in the current rotation of the three CEOs ^[10] .

Despite the fact that Ren Zhengfei is the largest shareholder of Huawei, its share is only 1.42% ^[11] . The remaining shares are distributed among 80,000 employees of Huawei ^[6] , while external shareholders are not provided for by the charter ^[4] .

The younger brother is Ren Shulu (Ren Shulu, born 1956), a graduate of Yunnan University, a Huawei employee since 1992, and is currently a member of the supervisory board and head of the logistics service of the company ^[4] .

Daughter - Meng Wanzhou (Meng Wanzhou, in the English. Sabrina Meng; born 1972) ^[4] , in 1998 received a master's degree at the Huazhong University of Science and Technology. Since 1993, he has been working at Huawei, and is currently the company's financial director ^[7] .

Ren Zhengfei enjoys reading books on politics, economics, humanities, literature and art. Most of all, he prefers historical literature, and least of all - fiction and dedicated to management theory. He explains this choice as follows ^[4] :

Fiction tells of fictional stories - and they are too far from reality. And management books are written by professors sitting in their offices behind locked doors - and this fetters the flight of their imagination. It is impossible to reduce live corporate governance to a fixed set of dogmas.

- Ren Zhengfei

Ren is a fan of the Qin Dynasty television series, which talks about the reforms of Chinese statesman Shang Yang. He bought thousands of disks with it for employees of Huawei ^[4] .

Of all the Chinese political leaders, Ren Zhengfei praises Deng Xiaoping , whom he has repeatedly called the greatest reformer in Chinese history. Of foreign politicians, the most respected of Ren is Yitzhak Rabin , and he even calls himself a student of the former Israeli prime minister ^[4] .

For most of his military career, Ren Zhengfei was denied the opportunity to join the Communist Party due to his parents' social background and their close ties to the Kuomintang regime. He joined the party just before his transfer to the reserve ^[4] .

Nevertheless, the alleged ties of Ren Zhengfei with the Chinese army and the Communist Party are one of the factors that significantly complicate the work of Huawei in other countries. They were used by the Government of India as an excuse for refusing to agree on Huawei winning individual contracts in India. ^{[12] [13]} These fears are shared by other countries. In the United States of America, they disrupted the 3Com acquisition of Huawei and forced SoftBank to sever ties with Huawei in an order to obtain permission to acquire Sprint Nextel . At the same time, the UK Intelligence and Security Committee recommended abandoning Huawei equipment due to suspected spying. ^{[14] [15]}