Huawei Inaugurates Second Batch of “Legions”

Shenzhen-headquartered telecommunications giant Huawei held a founding conference for its second batch of business “legions” on March 30, according to information released recently by the firm’s internal communication platform.

This new group of teams, which are referred to as juntuan in Chinese (军团 jūntuán – “army group” or “legion”), include Electric Power Digitalization, Governance Solutions, Smart Airports and Rail Links, Interactive Media, Sports Health, Display Chips, Industry Park Networks, Wide Area Networks, Data Center Bases, and Digital Sites.

The second batch is subdivided further and covers much wider fields compared with the five previously established legions including Coal Mines, Smart Highways, Customs and Ports, Smart Photovoltaics and Data Center Energy.  For example, interactive media and sports health legions belong to consumer business, while display chips legion is related to Huawei’s chip company HiSilicon, while industrial park networks and data center network legions belong to operator businesses.

During the ceremony, many core executives of the firm showed up to present the teams with a flag and gave speeches, including Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei and his daughter, rotating chairman Meng Wanzhou. While the company navigates a challenging period in its development, Huawei called its establishment of legions as “flexible strategy and tactics.”

This newly formed second batch of teams is actually the top ten “reserve legions” previously established by Huawei at the end of February. These reserve legions have to go through a period of operation to be decided whether to become a full member according to their business performance.

Huawei’s legion model purportedly originated from Google. The strategy involves bringing together talent from various fields in one department, including basic research scientists, technical experts, product experts, engineering experts, sales experts, delivery experts and service experts, then integrating them into independent departments with subdivided scenarios as units. This shortens the cycle of a product’s progress, making breakthroughs in key industries and finding new growth engines for the company.

SEE ALSO: Huawei Sets Up 10 More Internal “Reserve Legions”

Ren previously described the legions’ structure as follows: breaking up the existing organizational boundaries through the legion module to quickly assemble resources, improve efficiency, penetrate a field, and produce more outcomes for the company. In 2021, Huawei achieved global sales revenue of 636.8 billion yuan ($99.977 billion), down 28.6% year-on-year. The firm’s net profit was 113.7 billion yuan ($17.85 billion), a year-on-year increase of 75.9%. In 2021, the firm’s R&D investment reached 142.7 billion yuan ($22.403 billion), accounting for 22.4% of its annual revenue.