Huawei: A Case Study of When Profit Sharing Works

One example that’s less well known in the West is Chinese telecom giant Huawei, a private company owned by its employees. Founded in 1987 by Ren Zhengfei, today it employs about 170,000 staff, including more than 40,000 non-Chinese (75% of employees outside China are local hires), and serves more than 3 billion customers worldwide. It is the only Chinese company that receives more sales revenue from markets outside China (67%) than from inside it. (Editor’s note: It’s worth noting that the U.S. isn’t one of those markets. Some U.S. lawmakers consider the company a security threat. For its part, Huawei’s internal policy is to use U.S. law as the guiding law in their international business.)