Ren Zhengfei was interviewed by Dragon Editor-in-Chief Jia Zheng at Huawei headquarters in Shenzhen on April 22.
Ren said that the most important thing for China at present is to continuously improve its own strength and rely on science, talent and education to narrow the gap with the United States.
In addition, industrial upgrading in Thailand and Vietnam also poses a challenge to China, and we need to continuously optimize and upgrade the industrial environment and enhance the country's competitiveness.
There are many people who believe that this epidemic will reshape the global industrial chain, and that countries in Europe, America and Japan will accelerate the transfer of the core links in the industrial chain to their own countries.
Ren said it would be wrong to shift the industrial chain to the home country because the economy must be going global and only globalization can be competitive, without which there is no competitiveness.
It is impossible for any one country to build an all-factor capability alone, and the cost of building an all-factor industry chain with one country's efforts alone is very high, he said.
The following is the translated full interview:
On the morning of April 22, 2020, Ren Zhengfei was interviewed by Dragon magazine editor-in-chief at Huawei headquarters in Shenzhen.
Jia Zheng: Hi Mr Ren, thank you for inviting me to Huawei Shenzhen and being interviewed by Dragon Magazine.
Everyone is no stranger to you, Huawei, especially in May last year when you were interviewed by Chinese and foreign media, some of your golden words can be said to be countless fans.
Last year's interview was in the context of the U.S. suppression of Huawei, and you also talked about how, despite the conflict with the U.S., Huawei will eventually contribute to human society together with the U.S.
Since this spring, with the spread of the new crown epidemic around the world, people have further deepened their understanding of the "100 years of unprecedented change".
As an entrepreneur, what are your thoughts on the future of the community of human destiny, global economic integration, and the future of China?
Ren Zhengfei: At present, the most important thing for China is to continuously improve its own strength, relying on science, talents and education to narrow the gap with the United States.
There can be no good industrial and agricultural development without science, talent and good education.
China must first of all be strong on its own, for example, there is a certain gap between our agricultural products and those of the United States in terms of price and quality, and it must learn from the United States on how to promote future progress in biological sciences.
What are our weaknesses? For example, many of the low-end industries have moved to Thailand and Vietnam, but now Thailand and Vietnam have also started to upgrade their industries, and they are constantly trying to get the Chinese high-tech enterprises to move to the past.
We now have to compete not only with the United States in terms of policy advantages, but also with Thailand and Vietnam, and if our advantages are not matched by theirs, then our goals and ideals will not be easily achieved.
Therefore, we need to continuously optimize and upgrade the industrial environment and enhance national competitiveness.
On the morning of April 22, 2020, Ren Zhengfei was interviewed by Dragon Editor-in-Chief Jia Zheng at Huawei headquarters in Shenzhen.
Jia Zheng: When education flourishes, the country flourishes, and when education is strong, the country is strong.
In an interview, you said that the strength of a country is achieved from the podium of the primary school classroom, and you have repeatedly mentioned the importance of basic education in our country, especially in rural areas. But nowadays, test-taking education has society focusing on the high school sprint.
How to improve the quality of education and the primary and secondary education system, especially basic primary education in less developed regions. What are your thoughts on this?
Ren Zhengfei: If we want to make the country more prosperous and stable, we must first give young people ideas and morals, and who gives them those ideas and morals? It is the primary school teachers.
The best time to develop children's imagination and creativity is before the age of ten, because they don't know the world and have no boundaries.
With a good educational approach, children's talents are well developed and their creative abilities are greatly enhanced.
At a certain time, they will choose their own subjects, and education in a country should be varied and not standardized.
The main problem now is that there is too little investment in rural education, because the funds have been used to build houses, and teachers' incomes should be substantially increased, because teachers are the basis for maintaining social stability, and children generally listen to what they say.
Many of the houses that are being built are empty, so can we use the funds for these houses to give children in less developed areas more nutrition, so that they can grow up and serve the country and contribute to the country.
"The strength of a nation is achieved from the rostrum of a primary school teacher." This quote was made by Field Marshal Prussian Mauch in 1870, and I am only quoting it.
In addition, not everyone is able to attend a prestigious university and assume a social responsibility. Those who could not all follow the same path should develop vocational education and learn a skill that would lead to employment and employment that would lift them out of poverty.
The Ministry of Veterans' Affairs has done a good job over the years and has contributed to national stability, so that the demobilized soldiers will be able to learn a skill and a trade when they change careers.
We cannot go all the way to elite education, many people do not need to go that far, there must be diversified vocational skills training, vocational training does not have to be a teaching method of learning with a thousand or two people.
The training fee charged by the master can support the family, and the apprentice is also brought out.
I once went to Stuttgart, Germany, and the president of the Academy of Engineering took me to see the first-year students of the engineering school, and each of them was given a piece of iron and a drawing of a gear when they enrolled.
Ask students not to use the machine, all with a file to file out this gear, and then install it on the transmission, go on the road to test, pass the test before grading.
Why is the quality of German cars good, compared to our education is just a drawing, not a practice, so the cars produced are not up to the quality of German cars.
In a country the size of China, it must rely on real enterprises to fully address employment. The reason is that real enterprises need multi-level talents, scientists, experts, engineers, technicians, technicians, workers and so on, and when these people are employed, society is stable.
Jia Zheng: You said that only a quiet stream of water can go farther inadvertently. Could you please talk about the philosophy behind this?
Ren Zhengfei: A small stream is always a small stream when the waves splash; a big river, a still water diving, is very powerful. The Yangtze River is the best way to govern without doing anything, no matter what you do with it, you will not ruin the river for eternity.
Jia Zheng: In the face of the new crown epidemic and further pressure from the US, 2020 seems to be off to a tougher start than last year. How does Huawei face such a double challenge?
Ren Zhengfei: It's more difficult, Huawei has resumed production since February 1 without any interruption. There were also a lot of people working overtime during the Spring Festival because we were in a race against time.
This epidemic has a certain impact on our production, sales and delivery, some supporting manufacturers can't increase the production quantity, logistics can't be delivered, in order to ensure health and safety, we help upstream and downstream to get them to work.
In addition, international logistics also has an impact, now the number of international flights has been significantly reduced, air transport costs have risen 3-5 times, which has an impact on us, in the face of the United States crackdown, or need to gradually overcome, we are in basic research, not yet able to catch up with the United States, to make up for this lesson is still very difficult.
In particular, the basic sciences are being taught. In the past it was the United States to do their homework, we bought back, now we have to do this homework ourselves, we need to spend some more money and some time, the economic benefits will decline some.
Jia Zheng: How is Huawei's production and sales at home and abroad in the face of the widespread impact of the world epidemic and the global economic development in deep trouble? Has the epidemic disrupted Huawei's entire development this year?
Ren Zhengfei: The epidemic has had little impact on the electronics industry, because everyone has to work from home and have meetings at home, and the network is very busy right now.
Huawei grew by 1.4 per cent in the first quarter, which is a bit lower, and we did not stop work because our health security government thought it was good and the rush period increased investment.
The biggest impact is the catering, tourism, aviation, hotel and other industries, the epidemic did not have much impact on the electronics industry, but the demand is greater than before.
Jia Zheng: There are many people who think that this epidemic will reshape the global industrial chain, and the European and Japanese countries will accelerate the transfer of the core links of the industrial chain to their own countries. How do you think this trend will affect the manufacturing industry in China?
Ren Zhengfei: It is wrong to move the industrial chain to China, because the economy must be going global, only globalization can be competitive, without globalization there is no competitiveness.
It is impossible for any one country to build an all-factor capacity alone, and the cost of building an all-factor industrial chain by one country alone is very high.
At present, a large number of China's low-end and middle-end manufacturing industry are moving to Thailand, Vietnam and other countries, the United States is also suppressing China's high-tech industries, China's manufacturing industry is in the middle layer, must be very difficult, can not have too many illusions.
Jia Zheng: We noticed that the Huawei P40 phone has no Google stuff at all, it is equipped with Huawei's own mobile service HMS.
What is the progress of HMS overseas promotion, what are the advantages of HMS compared with Google? Recently Huawei consumer business CEO Richard Yu said in an interview, Huawei mobile phone can be completely without American parts, may I ask if this situation is true?
Ren Zhengfei: It is possible to not use American parts, but others do not buy it. The sales of Android and Apple's operating systems in the world are huge and consumers are already familiar with both operating systems.
Huawei is a late bloomer, and it's hard to get consumers to agree with our operating system. So, Huawei's operating system to surpass Android and Apple's operating system, may take a long time, but not more than 300 years.
Our relationship with Google, Apple is very friendly, although our phone does not carry Android system, but Samsung and other brands of mobile phones have, our 5G base station sales in the world, Apple, Samsung and other brands of mobile phones use our base station, with the ecology.
We have Apple and Android to thank, 5G performance is well played, just like a favor to us.
Android is helping us, Apple is also helping us, if not their ecology, our base station is no use.
So Huawei's operating system is not vicious competition, just say when others do not give us a way out.
Our operating system has just started, Android's ecosystem has 2.8 million APPs, and our ecology has tens of thousands, with a huge gap.
Of course, our system is post-developed and will have some advantages, but the advantages will be recognized only after the consumer experience.
Jia Zheng: Will Huawei replace all American parts in its phones in the future?
Ren Zhengfei: No, America will always be our good friend. We purchased $18.7 billion in parts in the United States last year, up from $11 billion in the past, a significant increase in the volume of parts purchased from the United States.
The US government has also approved a number of US companies to supply us.
The proposals of a few American politicians do not fully represent the views of the United States Government, and many American companies have the approval of the United States Department of Commerce to supply us with parts, and we have no idea of replacing American parts.
Jia Zheng: In this epidemic, Huawei has donated a lot of masks and medical protection items to the United States and Canada, but some people have questioned this, saying that this is to allow Canada to allow Huawei access to the local 5G network construction, which will affect the extradition case of Ms. Meng in Canada, how do you respond to such questions?
Ren Zhengfei: We have provided epidemic prevention support to many countries, which is not our main business, our main business is information and communication, for example, the King of Spain called me and we sent an urgent shipment of epidemic prevention supplies.
Donations to the US and Canada were made by us only after they asked for help.
In general, people need to care for each other and help each other, and whenever help is sought, we do what we can to support it, and these donations are humanitarian aid, without purpose and without any quid pro quo.
Jia Zheng: What do you think is the key to gaining trust abroad as a Chinese company? What can Chinese technology companies do to better win the trust of the world?
Ren Zhengfei: To put the interests of customers first, to be honest and abide by the law, only then can we adapt to the international environment and survive in the fierce international competition.
Jia Zheng: China-US relations directly affect Huawei, how do you see the development of China-US relations and are you optimistic about the relationship between the two countries?
Ren Zhengfei: Huawei is a purely commercial company and has no sales in the US, so it doesn't have much influence on Huawei at the moment.
Jia Zheng: As far as I know, Huawei has at least 700 mathematicians, 800+ physicists, 120+ chemists, 6-7,000 experts in basic research and 60,000+ engineers. How does Huawei attract and nurture the best talent?
Ren Zhengfei: Society may think that Huawei doesn't have so many scientists because they have mythologized scientists as theoretical, applied and algorithmic.
We have made a lot of breakthroughs in the underlying algorithm, we call these excellent experts who do not directly create value also called scientists, most of them are foreign high-end employees, constituting a breakthrough in theoretical structure, so Huawei is still relatively high in the academic structure.
Of course, in the development of some operating systems, secondary school and college students also occupy a certain proportion. The key to attracting talent is a sense of mission, and providing a platform to do what they want to do will satisfy the greatest aspirations of scientists.
In fact, scientists don't care about anything else but how to achieve their ideals.
Jia Zheng: I have read many of your articles about Huawei, such as "How long will Huawei's red flag last", I want to know, if Huawei enters the post-Ren Zhengfei era one day, will the corporate culture genes that have been passed down for 33 years change? What are your plans for Huawei's development in the next 10 years and beyond?
Ren Zhengfei: My presence or absence will not matter.