Cathy Meng spoke at Huawei ICT Finance Forum
Dr. Greenspan, distinguished partners, ladies and gentlemen,
Good morning!
Today, we're gathered in New York to share our insights into ICT finance. On behalf of Huawei, I'd like to extend the warmest welcome to all of you.
New York is a vibrant city with unlimited potential. The US is a country that has given birth to the most advanced society and countless outstanding individuals. The Internet was originated in the US and now serves as the basic infrastructure and tool of the information era. It is promoting the development of all industries, including finance, and driving civilization toward the information era. The US has also produced many visionary leaders like Steve Jobs, a hero in the digital age who made mobile Internet part of our life. These achievements can be attributed to the idealism and dedication of the American people and the advanced, flexible systems of the US, and more importantly to the American culture, in which individuals are respected, innovations are encouraged, failures are tolerated, and intellectual property rights are protected.
Huawei's success today is the result of continuous learning from the US. Over the past two decades, Huawei has cooperated with many leading US companies, learning from their advanced concept, management, methodologies. In the future, we will continue to learn from the US; in fact it will be our teacher for a long time.
In order to give you a better understanding of Huawei, I would like to talk briefly about our business and the key factors that have led to our success.
Huawei is an enabler of the information society. Deployed in more than 170 countries and regions, our products and solutions today serve one-third of the world's population, helping people bridge the digital divide and move into the network and information era. As we know, the standardization facilitated by compatible IBM computers and the ease of use enabled by Microsoft's Windows operating system have led to the widespread adoption of PCs and brought us into the computer era. Cisco's IP technologies have changed the way people perceive digital transmission and IP technology direction, laying the foundation for the network society today. Likewise, the deployment of Huawei's network equipment has accelerated the process of building the network society, ushering in the Internet era and opening a window into an amazing new world. Huawei is committed to building a better connected world that links people to people, things to things, and people to things. The unlimited possibilities brought about by a digital, connected world are driving us forward into the era of information and Big Data.
Huawei is a leading provider of end-to-end ICT solutions and a trusted strategic partner of our customers. With the unwavering commitment to customer-centric innovations, long-term investment in R&D, and quality service delivering to our customers, we have established leading positions or have become the leader in fields such as fixed, mobile, IP, and optical networks, smart devices, and IT infrastructure. Today, Huawei provides the most comprehensive portfolio of ICT solutions.
More importantly, we are aware that ensuring secure and stable network operations is our most important corporate social responsibility and mission as an equipment vendor. Over the past 27 years, we've lived up to our responsibility and mission. No matter what they faced, whether the radioactive ground in Fukushima, Japan, the epicenter of the 9.0-degree earthquake in Chile, or the countries and regions torn apart by political turmoil, our employees have held strong to their positions to ensure secure and stable network operations. When people rushed away from dangerous environments, our employees ran in the opposite direction. We know that doing so means taking on huge risks. But, if networks are down, more people will suffer far greater miseries.
Huawei has grown with the times and provided an arena for our employees to achieve their aspirations. In accordance with the long-wave theory of Russian economist Kondratieff, there will be one technological transformation every 50 to 60 years that helps drive economic development. This has proven true over 200 years of social development. Following the eras of the steam engine, iron and steel, electric, and automobiles, countries such as the UK, the US, Germany, and Japan rose to dominance by leveraging the opportunities presented by these technological transformations. Since entering the information era in 1990, the US has seized strategic opportunities emerging from this new technological transformation, and managed to stand at the forefront of the world once again. There are many more outstanding innovations facilitated by the vertical integration of companies like Apple; these innovations have accelerated the development of the Internet.
With a global view of the big trends, our corporate executives have seized the opportunities offered by this new era, and by following the footsteps of giants, they managed to turn Huawei into the industry leader today. By standing on the shoulders of giants, we've identified the trends for future development. Our 150,000 employees have grown together with the company, the industry, and the information era. Through years of practical experience, our employees have maximized their own value. Our global business operations have enabled them to fulfill their aspirations at Huawei. Opportunities are the most valuable treasure.
Huawei's success today has its intrinsic logic and is something we considered certain to happen.
The fundamental reason for Huawei's success is our core values - being customer-centric, treating dedicated employees as the foundation, and continuous dedication. Twenty years ago, we put forward the concept that serving customers is the only reason Huawei exists. Based on this concept, we've established customer-centric organizations and processes, served customers wholeheartedly, and shared the value we have brought to the industry chain with our customers and partners. Our employees often need to overcome extremely harsh conditions. For example, on Mount Qomolangma and the 74-degree-north-latitude North Pole, our employees have left clear footprints. From the east of the Pacific to the west of the Atlantic, from the north of the Arctic Ocean to the Southern point of South America, from the high plateaus of Bolivia to the low lands of the Dead Sea, and from the tropical rainforests filled with mosquitoes and insects to the scorching deserts..., in all these places there are Huawei employees serving our customers, making people's dreams of communication come true through the deployment of 3G and LTE networks. Customer-centricity has become part of our corporate DNA. At Huawei, we give more rewards and opportunities to dedicated employees, and to employees who work long-term in hardship regions. In this way, they are able to share more of the value and opportunities created during the company's growth. These cultural values are not the inventions of Huawei; they are also held dear by the American people. "Sleepless Silicon Valley" is a typical example of such cultures and spirits.
At Huawei, we adhere to open cooperation and continuous innovation, and constantly strengthen our technological foundation; we focus on ICT infrastructure and refuse to be opportunistic. We're well aware that the value of networks lies in interconnectivity and the value of information lies in sharing. Openness is the fundamental attribute of the communications and IT industries. Closed systems are valueless and have no future. In view of this, Huawei advocates being open and cooperative in technological fields. We also advocate integrating with mainstream international technical standards such as 3GPP and IETF, thus promoting industry development through collaboration with other industry players. Huawei has grown in this process as well. We don't pursue independent innovations in a narrow-minded manner. Instead, we encourage our technical experts to participate in our globalization efforts, absorbing energy over a cup of coffee from top-notch talent worldwide. Thanks to its openness, the US has attracted the best talent from around the world and become the most advanced country. We must continue to learn from the US in the future. We don't blindly pursue technological innovations. We've established 28 joint innovation centers with our leading customers globally, enabling our technologies to create business value directly for them.
Of particular note, our technological leadership is based on our innovations in basic technologies at the bottom of the pyramid, including mathematics, algorithms, chips, and engineering. We attach equal importance to scientists' and engineers' innovations to continuously improve the core competences of our products. For example, we've launched industry-leading software-defined SingleRAN that supports 2G, 3G, and 4G networks, and the 400G router that is two years ahead of those of our industry peers. These products are built upon innovations in basic technologies. Still, we know that Huawei is a company with limited capabilities and can secure a leadership position only when our focus is no bigger than the tip of a needle and when we pool all our efforts to make breakthroughs in this area. We must focus all our technological innovations and industrial investments on one area only – ICT infrastructure – and reject all opportunities from other areas.Now, let's get back to the topic of finance. The financial crisis has dragged on for six years. During these six years, the global economy has gone through many ups and downs. Now, I'd like to share some of my thoughts.
The financial crisis is still with us. There won't be a U turn or a V turn; rather, the changes will be in spiral form. Huawei has been well prepared for the financial crisis. The global economy will be further integrated and form a complete chain, with all parts being interdependent. If one part has a problem, a Domino effect will occur and a negative cycle will begin. Therefore, we don't think that the financial crisis has reached the bottom. We still should work together to cope with it.
As early as three years ago, we began to take measures to cope with the financial crisis. For example, we continuously narrowed our business focus, downsized or even slashed non-core businesses, and focused on our strategic area in order to ensure the sound operations of each of our business units. We've been well prepared for the coming winter.
The steady development of Huawei is our responsibility to society. As our products and solutions now serve one-third of the world's population, we clearly feel great responsibilities on our shoulders. If Huawei collapses, consumers, enterprises, our customers, and the information society will suffer an immeasurable loss. We must comply with laws and regulations of the countries in which we operate, maintain order in the marketplace, strive to provide our customers with superior services, and ensure Huawei's healthy and stable growth. In that event, we would be deemed irresponsible both to customers and society as a whole.
We believe that a technological revolution is sure to take place after next ten to twenty years. As breakthroughs are made in basic technologies such as graphene, the electronic information industry is near the edge of this coming revolution. The hopes of this technological revolution have been placed on the education of young people, and the entire world is competing in rural education, turning the advantage in population into the advantage in talent. Huawei will proactively participate in this new revolution to keep up with the times, and contribute to the advancement of mankind. Finance not only supports industry development today; it will also be the facilitator and catalyst for a new round of technological transformations. Today, finance and ICT experts from around the world will share their insights. I believe this forum will be enjoyable and insightful!
