Transcription
Hi everybody and welcome to In Good Company. I'm Nicolola Tangan, the CEO of the Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund, and I'm, today I'm in particularly good company with the CFO of Xiaomi, Alla Lamb.
"Hello Nicola, thanks for having me."
Now, uh, Alla, um, Xiaomi is just an incredible company with phones, cars, humanoids. Um, you know, we are the lucky owner of more than 1% of the company. So, um, just tell us, uh, what do you do and, um, and how did it all happen?
"Well, thanks, Nicola. Thanks for the question. Uh, and good to be here. Um, so, first of all, Xiaomi is still a very young company. We just turned 16. Um, we founded in uh, April 6, on April 6, 2010. Um, and since then, we have, uh, done a lot, as you mentioned. Uh, but ultimately, I think we think of ourselves as a global technology company. Obviously, we have smartphones, we have a lot of smart devices. Uh, plus, uh, recently, we have smart electric vehicles, and we are into manufacturing. Uh, but underlying all of these is our technology, whether it is, uh, our operating system, our semiconductors, our AI. I think those are the stuff that, uh, that we built, um, underneath all of our ecosystem, right?"
"Um, I think we built a pretty comprehensive, uh, what we call a human-time, car-time, home ecosystem, ranging from all your personal devices to all your home devices, and now with your mobility solutions. So, um, that's where we are. But, you know, we've achieved quite a bit, uh, you know, over the last 15 years. You know, obviously, uh, last year, we had over 450 billion RMB in terms of sales, and, um, you know, and we have achieved, um, you know, pretty good profitability."
"It's just such an incredible story. So, I'm not quite sure even where to start, but why don't we just go through it chronologically? Uh, the first product you had, um, you know, just how did you, just how did it start?"
"We actually started off building the operating system for smartphones, and that was in 2010 when we founded the company. We wanted to do a, you know, uh, operating system on top of the Android ecosystem and then try to, uh, offer it to, uh, smartphones. Um, but eventually, we decided to get into the smartphone ourselves, right? And our first smartphone, which we call Xiaomi One, uh, we sold it at 1999 RMB in China. And that became a huge success because, I mean, as you remember, back in the days, there were a lot of products out there that were low quality but high prices."
"How long time did it take you to develop the telephone?"
"So, uh, we launched our first smartphone in 2011. So, one year after we..."
"How is it possible to have such a short cycle time?"
"Yeah, because at that time, I think there is a lot of, you know, the supply chain is obviously quite advanced in China. But the problem in the market for that at that time was there was a lot of expensive products with very low quality, right? And the philosophy for the, for the company is that, can we do a smartphone that is much better quality and can, you know, and we can offer to users at much more affordable prices? And that's something that you see permeated in the history of, of our products, right? We try to offer, you know, very high-quality solutions to our users at affordable prices."
"How do you think about your supply chain? How much of that is Chinese sourced and how much is sourced outside?"
"Well, I mean, at the beginning, I think there's still a lot of reliance on, uh, you know, foreign technologies. Um, but over the last 15 years, uh, for a smartphone, frankly, most of the content now, uh, is localized. You can find local solutions for that, uh, in most of our components."
"How much easier is it for you as a firm to be fast in product development when you can source everything locally?"
"Um, it is important, uh, because the local, um, you know, frankly speaking, if you think about the foreign, uh, products, a lot of them are more standardized solutions, off-the-shelf, right? Whereas the local partners are willing to work with you, uh, developing products that are more customized, uh, to what, you know, we want, right? And, and, and as a result, it's not just faster, but it's also our ability to offer much more customized solutions that fits better into our smartphone, that fits better into what we want. And as a result, you know, we go to market, uh, we are able to offer, you know, products to our customers at, you know, as some offer something that they really want."
"So, you are now at model 17. Um, you've aligned with, uh, with the Apple, uh, kind of numbers. You had a setback in 16. What, what happened then?"
"Well, I think, um, there was such a big leap between 15 and 17 that we think that it's, it's beyond one generation in terms of improvement from our Xiaomi 17 to our Xiaomi 15. And hence, we named it, uh, Xiaomi 17. Uh, you know, and the innovation comes when you look at the smartphone. I don't have one with me right now, unfortunately, but it offered a back panel, right? So instead of having a front panel, like most, most smartphones do, we actually offer the back panel as well. So, so you can, you can use both sides, uh, effectively. Uh, and that's something that has proven to be, uh, a lot of ground, I mean, very groundbreaking, and a lot of our users like it."
"How, uh, important, um, has the kind of the internet of things or your connectivity with home appliances been?"
"It is important because I think in this world, uh, a lot of our users like intelligent, uh, solutions, right? So, you know, think about air conditioners, think about washing machines, think about refrigerators. People, I mean, the technology has existed for 30, 50 years, but that hasn't changed for, you know, uh, for a long time, right? So what we, what we offer to our users is, you know, a smart solutions, right? Now you can upgrade your software over the air in your devices, right? As opposed to buying new machines, right? And a lot of our users value that. Plus the fact is, can you make your whole, you know, lifestyle, whole ecosystem much smarter by connecting everything together so that they can do things for you? Not just, you know, using your smartphone as a remote control, but smart intelligence solutions that they understand who you are, they understand your behavior, and they can try to offer customized solutions for you every day."
"What are the kind of things that you, you, that you can offer clients?"
"Yeah, for example, uh, smart lock, right? And many people now install, uh, instead of a traditional lock, a smart lock, right? Not just you can look at, you know, who's outside of your door, who's delivering stuff to you, you can offer specialized passwords for people to enter your apartment so that you don't leak your, you know, secrecy. But also, if you interconnect it with other devices at home, for example, when you open your smart lock, your AC will automatically be switched on, right? That you don't have to do anything extra, right? And those are the smart solutions that we like to think that our users need and, uh, you know, and obviously that become very popular features among our users."
"And then you decided to make a car."
"Correct. Um, we decided to get into the car industry, uh, in 2021, and, uh, and, and then we launched our first car in 2024."
"How is that possible?"
"So, uh, a little bit over less than three years, we launched our first car. We designed it, and then we built a factory as well. So, um, China speed."
"Tell me about China speed."
"Um, so, so look, at the beginning, um, you know, the car industry to us is not that foreign. Uh, Xiaomi, as a company, has already invested in some of the EV, uh, manufacturers in China before. So we have an experience of seeing them develop, helping them develop, uh, over time. But then we decided to do it ourselves. And, as you, as you know, we've done a lot of due diligence in the industry the moment we decided to get into this industry. And I think the ultimate solution is our ultimate conclusion, I should say, is that, you know, you know, if you believe that a car, an EV, right, is going to be another piece of consumer electronics, and that's something that we have a lot of experience in, whether it is managing the software, hardware integration, whether it is managing the supply chain. I think those are the stuff that, you know, we have experienced working with so many consumer electronics products before. I mean, obviously, a car is a little bit, uh, of a different animal because you need to consider about safety, you know, uh, but, you know, again, I think the supply chain in China has been relatively well-developed on the EV industry. So, as we go into that, I think, um, what we said was, look, can we spend 10 times more investment to build the first car? Right? I think that's, that's also a very important philosophy as well. Is instead of going into all these different directions, making multiple cars, we decided to spend all of our efforts on one single car."
"And it's a pretty fast car, right? Because now you, you set the record for the quickest, uh, uh, round on Nürburgring last year."
"Yeah, look, I think, as we look into this car industry, in the EV industry as well, we think that there are certain things that are core to the EV technology that we want to own and develop ourselves, right? The rest, we can have our suppliers work with us on that. But things like the electric motors is something that we've spent real efforts on. Things like the, uh, how do you pack the battery? Things like smart driving, uh, assisted driving, etc. Those are the stuff that we spend, you know, a real time on developing our proprietary technology. The rest of it, I think we can rely on other people, uh, to supply us with the industry solutions."
"How many people do you have in R&D? Uh, at the beginning, probably around 3,000 people to de, to develop the first car, which is, as you know, in this industry, probably 10 times more than other peers, uh, in terms of developing, uh, the first car, because our chairman has the philosophy that, you know, we want to spend, you know, a lot of, you know, effort initially to catch up with our peers."
"Now, uh, you sold 50,000 cars in 30 minutes."
"Um, yeah, yeah, yeah, because, look, I think, um, obviously, we are a very new entrant to the EV business. But, uh, but obviously, at the same time, we already have a very established brand in China. Uh, we have a loyal, a lot of loyal, uh, users of our products. We have over 180 million, uh, people in China that are using our smartphones every day. Uh, and at the beginning, when we decided, uh, to, uh, to develop a car, to develop an EV, a lot of our users saying that, you know, if Xiaomi wants to make a car, we'll buy it, right? So, you know, you know, 20 plus percent of our initial buyers haven't even test-driven the car, haven't even, you know, uh, seen the car, uh, in in real life, right? They just see us launching the car and they put an order in. So that's a testament to the loyal users that we've built up. They're loyal to the brand, and they know that we're going to make the best products for them."
"How do you get people to love you?"
"Um, well, I think, I think it goes back to our philosophy, right? If you look at our mission, uh, we want to build amazing products with honest prices to let everyone in the world enjoy a better life through innovative technology, right? It's a long sentence, but, you know, we want to build amazing products. Uh, we want to offer these products at, you know, what we call honest prices, uh, to our users, and we want to do a global business, right? And we want to be innovative. So, I think all those, all these stuff are what, all these things are, all these features are what, uh, users really value these days. And, you know, over time, uh, we've also, you know, made the coolest products. Uh, we make a lot of friends with our users. Uh, we stay engaged with our users, listen to the feedback, and, uh, and try to change our product based on these feedbacks. So, so those are the stuff that we built a very good rapport with our users over time, and that's how they are loyal to our brand. They know that whenever they walk into our store, they, whenever they buy one of Xiaomi's products, they are getting the best pricing possible."
"What are the similarities between making a phone and a car?"
"Um, some, diff, some similarities, a lot of differences, obviously. Um, if you look at, uh, the phone industry, uh, before 2024, we did not have a first factory, uh, smartphone factory. So before that, we were all using, you know, outsourcing it to the Foxconn of the world, the BYD of the world, and other, other suppliers to make the phones for us. Uh, so we are more responsible for the design, for some of the basic technology, for some of the technology, and also for, you know, the branding and the marketing of the products. For the car business, uh, you know, we also undertook the task of building an, uh, entire new factory in Beijing, right? And so that is a new experience for us. That's, you know, that's our first, you know, real large-scale factory that built our own car. So that, that's, that's the difference, right? I think that's the one key difference between, uh, you know, how we entered into the car business versus how we entered, uh, the smartphone business. But there's a lot of similarities because increasingly the software drives the hardware, right? In the EV, just like they're in the smartphone. And a lot of it is, you know, you know, in in smartphone, we stack up a lot of, uh, chipsets into a very small form factor. In the car, it's similar. We have to stack up a lot of components and, you know, other things into a into a form factor. Uh, but increasingly more important, important, especially in the EV world, the software becomes very important. How do you manage battery power? How do you manage the software to drive the car in a safe manner? I think those are very important, uh, similarities with the, uh, with the, uh, with the smartphone business. Obviously, managing the supply chain is also very important. Uh, we have a lot of, uh, suppliers that are quite that are the same between the smartphone business as well as the EV business. And that's why, um, you know, that there's a lot of cross-collaboration. I think people trust, uh, the engineers, uh, of Xiaomi, that we can build something that is world-class and that is very popular with the users."
"How far behind is Europe when it comes to EVs?"
"Now, um, look, we still look up to the, um, you know, a lot of the OEMs, the traditional OEMs. We still think that there's a lot of things to learn from them. The way that they build the brand, the way, the way that they build the drivetrain, the way, the way that they give people a real good driving experience. Those are the stuff that we still look up to a lot of the European OEMs. Uh, what we think that they are lacking, uh, are, number one, I think the smartness of the car. I think they try to implement a lot of the smart features, uh, into the car right now. I think in that sense, they are probably behind, uh, what we are seeing in China right now. And then, then second is kind of the whole, and, you know, NEV, the new energy vehicle development, right? I think that they were, a lot of the focus was on electric at that time, but really, I think when we look at, uh, our EV, we call it a smart electric vehicle, right? And, uh, I think that some OEMs may look at electric to, you know, uh, too focused on electric, but let's focus on smart, right? I think that, that, that's one thing that, you know, our, the users right now really want, especially given the Xiaomi advantage, is how do I link it with all of our ecosystem products? How do it work better with my smartphones? How do work better with my IoT devices? You know, things like that that I can create not just an EV, but also a, you know, smart life ecosystem, uh, uh, beyond the EV."
"And how long time do you think it would take the Western brands to catch up on that particular element?"
"Uh, no, I think, I think a lot of people are learning, right? I, I think a lot of people are studying how the Chinese, uh, EV development has become so advanced. Uh, we have obviously received quite a lot of European OEMs who come to visit us, who come to, you know, want to have experience sharing with us, not just we sharing with them, but they also share with us, you know, it depends on, you know, how serious they are. And I think, I think you already see a couple of the European collaborations with the Chinese players as well, right? So I think that that's going to be helpful in driving the industry forward."
"Now, I think it was the CEO of Ford who, uh, who used your SU7 for a little while. Uh, what did he say about it?"
"He said he couldn't get rid of it after six months of driving it."
"Because he loved it too much."
"Uh, apparently, I haven't spoken with him in person, but apparently, based on what he's been saying in public, he loves our car."
"How is the, uh, EV market going to develop going forward?"
"Uh, look, I think, um, the EV penetration will continue to go, you know, to, to be higher. In China, it's already, new car sales is already 50, 60% new, new energy vehicle, right? So, so that's very, uh, high already. But if you look at a lot of the global market, the EV, the new EV market is still quite low in terms of penetration. So I think that, you know, as the infrastructure continues to develop, as people appreciate, uh, the smartness, the, the drivability of these new electric vehicles, I think the penetration will go up."
"So when you see European and, um, and American producers actually pulling back their EV, uh, efforts, how do you, what do you think about that?"
"Uh, look, I think, uh, you know, obviously, there's a lot of investment that needs to go in, especially for, uh, many of the legacy, uh, uh, brands because they need to retool the whole systems to get, uh, NEV done. So, you know, so, and a lot of them are, you know, probably not pushing that agenda as forward. But I, I, you know, honestly speaking, we don't think that they're, you know, we think that the NEV is going to continue to penetrate, you know, whether, uh, the Chinese players are coming in, or whether the European and the American players are developing it themselves, or also the, also the Japanese and the Koreans. So, so I actually think that, you know, the trend will be there longer term, right? There's obviously, you know, maybe hiccups along the way, but the whole industry, I think, will move forward in this direction. As, you know, sometimes there's, there's a major breakthrough in terms of, you know, smartness of the vehicles and also the infrastructure. I think, you know, there, there are a lot of places whereby the infrastructure is probably not as well developed, uh, in in the other markets for, for the EV market to take off."
"Let's move on to robotics and humanoids. Um, what are you doing there? I've just seen your latest models and it's, uh..."
"Uh, yeah, look,"
"It's pretty mind-boggling."
"We've been doing robotics, uh, for five, six years now. Uh, that, that's some, that's an investment that we, we've started making back in 2019, 2020. Um, but then, I think we are beginning to see the inflection point in in this in this market. Uh, a, a, you know, combination of the hardware getting better, as well as the software getting better, i.e., AI, you know, that is driving the brain of the of the robots. Um, uh, the way that we are thinking, Xiaomi internally is thinking about it is, we are making these humanoid robots to enhance our own manufacturing capability and efficiency. Uh, we are, we haven't launched any 2C robots. So all the robots that we are developing, all the humanoid robots we are developing right now are used in our own manufacturing scenario. I think the video already showed that there were two robots that are working, uh, uh, consecutively for three hours with a, with a very low margin of error. So, but still, I think that's a long way to go. That's a long way to go because, as you know, and I'm sure that we'll move to AI at some point in this conversation, right? Um, the AI right now is mostly focusing on, you know, learning from the text data, from the voice data that have we have accumulated for a long, long time. But then the physical data are still, you know, quite a way behind in terms of the collection and the interpretation. So, so I, I do think that the, the, when you develop the, the large language model for, for physical AI right now, what we still lacking is a lot of data that that don't exist, right? So, you have to simulate it. You have to find out the use cases and find the corner cases, uh, etc., etc. But, you know, the text and the voice are quite, quite well developed at this point."
"Can you tell us about the, the improvement in, in the grip, uh, uh, functionality in your latest model?"
"Yeah, look, I think, uh, if you look at the video that they showed, like the, the hand is much smaller than than the other versions. The hand is, uh, very similar to a human hand size now, right? And also the degree of freedom that it offers, right? Right. I mean, I mean, I think one of the, one of the biggest challenges with the hand is how many degrees of freedom do you have in the, uh, in the, in the hand. And then the, the second problem that we're trying to solve is the cooling, right? It's like a, it's like a smartphone. It's like, uh, when you use the machines for too long, it gets heated, right? And once it gets heated, you know, the, the consumer electronics rule will say that the, the performance will degrade, right? So what we're trying to do also is introduce a cooling system that you can, you know, do some heat management of the hand as well, so that it doesn't get overheated, uh, while you are doing the stuff, uh, the work with repetitive."
"When do you think you'll have this for consumers?"
"That's not the focus of Xiaomi right now, to be honest. Uh, because, uh, we actually think that, uh, there is a big space, uh, for us to, because ultimately, we do hardware, right? We do a lot of hardware. Um, and, uh, there's a lot of manufacturing involved, right? So we want these, uh, humanoid robots to be able to do, you know, to improve our manufacturing efficiency first, and maybe to recreate our entire manufacturing processes. Could, could be, but that's already a huge market. So right now, we're not thinking about, uh, doing any 2C robot at this point in time."
"Who do you think will win this race?"
"It's hard to say, but, um, but it suffices to say that, you know, uh, if you look at this market right now, in terms of innovation, in terms of entrepreneurship, in terms of technology leadership, there are two big superpowers in the world, right? The US and, uh, and, and, and China. So, you know, the winner will come from one of these two places, but I don't know where yet."
"What's next?"
"Well, I think, I mean, we, we talk a lot about, you know, uh, what we've been doing. Uh, I think that, um, the next thing for us is, you know, continue to develop our AI capabilities. I think that AI is going to be very important, uh, for the next wave of innovations, and it will permeate, it will impact all of our businesses."
"How do you use it today in the company?"
"Um, well, I mean, I think, uh, the simple things are coding, right? So, uh, a lot of our software engineers now use AI for coding. Um, number one. Second one is, can we improve our sales efficiency? Can we predict sales better? Right? I.e., do I even need to hire an experienced sales store manager, or I can use AI to predict what kind of sales should each store generate every day? Right? Uh, uh, marketing materials, right? We can, we use AI to generate the first few drafts. And very importantly, even in the manufacturing process, we've been using AI a lot, right? So when we talk about our car, uh, we, we have a big gigapress, right? That does the rear floor for the car. Um, but in terms of the material we use for that, for that rear floor, we generated over, we simulated over 100 plus formulas and used AI to predict the performance of each of these formulas, and ultimately we picked two, uh, to be the material for that three or four that we do for the gigapress that we do, right? In terms of like, you know, and in terms of each piece that we manufactured, they went through an X-ray room, when they take a lot of pictures, and they use AI to look into that to see whether there are defects in the, in the, in the manufacturing process, right? So you don't use humans to do it anymore. You just use AI to take pictures very quickly. They can diagnose whether this piece is good or not. And then you can use AI in terms of material generation and a lot of those things. So, so we're using AI in a lot of different areas. Uh, but, you know, you know, but then there are more to do. I think there are more to do going forward."
"You also developed your own language model."
"Yes, we just launched it, uh, two weeks ago. So we launched our own large language model, um, two weeks ago, and it has performed pretty well. I mean, if you look at public scoring systems like openrouter.com, uh, you know, you can see that we have been ranked, you know, very highly on that, on that, on that table. So, so we're very glad that, um, we, you know, we have a, you know, a, uh, a large language model that people like and people use."
"And at much lower costs than the likes of Claude."
"Um, well, I mean, these costs are never disclosed publicly disclosed information. So I, I don't quite know the cost of it, but our price that we offered are lower than Claude, uh, but much higher than the other, uh, you know, models from China that are being offered right now."
"What are the cost advantages you have, uh, when it comes to, uh, you know, the utilization of these models, giving lower energy costs, simpler, uh, model structures, and so on?"
"Um, we, we did try to innovate a bit on the, uh, on the infrastructure of the model. So, so obviously, we have the benefit of seeing how other people do it before, and then we try to optimize our path. So, so in terms of infrastructure, we have done some innovations, although we didn't talk too much publicly about that. Uh, number one, number two is, um, if you think about the, the, the model development right now, I think there's still a long way to go. The good thing for Xiaomi, in a way, is I already have a big ecosystem that we can use to test, we can collect data from, uh, from those user behaviors, and we can refine our model."
"Last thing is obviously, as you know, that we put it as an open-source model. So we're also trying to, to, uh, invite the best, uh, the best minds globally to help improve that model as a result."
"What is it going to mean that, uh, many of the Chinese models are open source?"
"Uh, that's, that's also a different approach, right? I think, I think different model companies will have different approaches in terms of how they want to do an open source or closed source. But I think that our, you know, our open-source model is obviously because we want to invite, uh, you know, we invite, uh, you know, other developers to jointly develop this model with us to help our ecosystem become smarter, right? And then to raise the, you know, experience, uh, ceiling of these models. And also, it helps us attract, you know, good talent, uh, to help us improve the model as well, right? Because ultimately, I think if you look at whether it's our car, whether it's our smartphone, you know, you know, we want to invite other people to join us, together, so that we can help improve the ecosystem together as well."
"So let's say 5, 10 years from now, when you have integrated, um, you know, all your, all your products with, uh, the latest, uh, AI models and so on, what is the, what's the vision of the world? What is it going to look like?"
"As we think about, uh, how AI is going to change the world, um, uh, and how do we fit into our own ecosystem, right? We think about the more in the physical AI world, right? How do we get AI into our phone? How do we get AI into our smart appliances? How do we get AI into our car? And then how to connect, interconnect these things to make, uh, users' lives more efficient, much better. I think that that's kind of how we see this, right? Um, and obviously, other people are using AI to serve the coder community, the coding community. Other people are trying to use AI to make, you know, very useful chatbots for the users so that they can, you know, they, they can use that chatbot to help them, you know, uh, manage their life better. But for us, for Xiaomi, because we have over, you know, a billion, uh, connected devices globally, we have over 800, uh, million, uh, uh, mobile smartphone, smartphone users globally. How do we interconnect these devices so that, uh, we will enhance people's productivity in the physical AI world? I think that's something that we, we are, we are, we are looking at, right?"
"I have to ask you a question about, uh, the founder, Lei Jun, who is kind of considered a mix of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Elon Musk. Um, how, uh, how is it to work with him?"
"Well, uh, Mr. Lei himself is an entrepreneur, serial entrepreneur, but he's also a, a product person, right? I think if you look at, when we get into the car industry, uh, we decided that he should be the CEO of the car business, uh, in order to take it forward. And he will, you know, I, I think you've seen other interviews, uh, of him as well, that he personally drove, he has personally driven 150 different models of car, right, himself, and take detailed notes so that he understands what's on offer in the market and how can he improve on it. I mean, I, I can, you know, I can, you know, I can assure that you can find very few CEOs that are real dedication, that have this real dedication to to start off with this car business, right? He makes us, like all the management team, like I personally drove 3,000 kilometers before the first car was launched, uh, in our own car, just to again, you know, his philosophy is that you have to understand the product. Uh, you have to love your product before you, you know, before you, you know, you are in this business, right? He makes us all take, uh, professional racing car, you know, licenses, uh, in order to, you know, to know how to drive properly. So, so he's, obviously, he's a visionary, he defined the company's culture, but he also tries to, you know, help us, right, enhance our knowledge, not just on the business, but also on the products that we offer."
"What are the other ways he influences the corporate culture of the company?"
"Well, I think, look, I mean, he's obviously a very hardworking guy, right? You know, he, he works, I mean, people know in China that he works very, very hard, and that obviously, you know, inspires all of us to follow suit, right? Um, uh, he is a visionary. I mean, I think he'll consider it visionary. Uh, he's also a very good investor, uh, in in China, um, you know, so, so I think those are the stuff that, uh, he defined the corporate culture."
"What does it mean to work hard in your book?"
"Work hard and work smart, right? I mean, obviously, we have a very, very complicated business, right? It is not, you know, we are in smartphones, we are in IoT, we are in cars, we have AI, we have operating systems, and we are in a, we're running our business in over 100 plus countries. We are also in the manufacturing industry, etc. So there's a lot of things to manage on a day-to-day basis. So by that already, you know, you can spend a lot of time doing daily jobs. Uh, but at the same time, I think, you know, what we need to do is work smart, right? I.e., what are the priorities? What are the three important things we want to achieve this quarter, this month, as well as this year, right? And we focus on those three things that matter, right? As opposed to getting immersed into a lot of, um, you know, uh, small tasks that may not have much of an impact. So for the management suite, we are more focusing on what's the most important things and how do we tackle that on a quarterly basis, on a yearly basis, on a monthly basis, and on a daily basis."
"You, you mentioned Chinese speed in the beginning. What's the key, what's the key to gaining speed?"
"Well, look, I think it's number one is, um, uh, you know, having the right infrastructure, right? If you look at the manufacturing supply chain, you know, in smartphones, in appliances, in also in the EV industry, it's very well-developed, uh, in in China already, right? I think that helps, that helps any business, uh, any consumer electronics business kickstart very, very quickly. Number one. Number two is, uh, the amount of innovation and entrepreneurship that is happening here, right? People are willing to, you know, spend the, the commitment on innovating stuff as opposed to just following stuff. And I think the third is really, uh, as you know, people in China do spend a lot of time working, right? And, um, you know, you know, at the same time, probably enjoying life at the same time, but, but, uh, they, they tend to, you know, spend up more hours, right? I mean, if you, if you spend more hours, I think, you know, that the investment will pay off at some point."
"What are your plans for Europe?"
"Um, look, we are already quite strong in Europe in terms of consumer electronics. Last year, we ranked number three in Europe in terms of smartphone sales. Uh, so we're up there with, uh, Apple and Samsung. Um, uh, next year, in the second half of next year, we're planning to, uh, to export our cars into Europe. So that's going to be a new and big joint venture for us. A new venture for us, not, not joint venture. Um, uh, and so that, that, that's going to be a new thing that will happen. Uh, and we are already investing a lot in Europe right now. Uh, as you can see, we have the car racing on Nürburgring. Uh, we also set up an EV research center in Munich, uh, this year, last year, with, you know, 75 to 100 engineers over there already developing some of the coolest products, right? I mean, we've showcased, uh, in in Barcelona this March, a Vision Gran Turismo product, which is a, you know, you know, concept car, uh, that, that we have, and that, that's developed by our European great fun."
"How do you personally relax?"
"Well, look, I, I did a lot of, uh, you know, uh, many people say working is relaxing. So I, I do work quite a lot. Uh, but at the same time, you have to find the right time. I, I spend a lot of time reading as well. I spend a lot of time doing exercise."
"What, what do you read?"
"Um, all kinds of books. Uh, research reports. I, I do like reading research reports on other companies. I do like reading business books. Uh, there are obviously a lot of successful examples in many of the industries that we are in, whether it is Apple, whether it's Tesla, you know, I read a lot of those books. But at the same time, I try to read a lot of books that, you know, talk about business failures, right? Why do some companies fail? And and then something that you always can learn, right? I think that there's one phrase that I really like is history always repeats itself, right? And so as you read more about these stories, business stories, you know how they, people can be successful, and you need to find your own path to success. But at the same time, you want to avoid the pitfalls that many, many companies have faced in the past."
"Working is relaxing. What does that mean?"
"I mean, you, you do need to enjoy your work. I think it's very important that you need to enjoy what you're doing. You need to enjoy your your colleagues, working with your colleagues. You need to enjoy working with other partners. Uh, you need to enjoy, you know, you know, uh, understanding what your users need. So, so those are, I mean, those are in itself can be, you know, quite enjoyable experiences as well as relaxing experiences. But at the same time, I do, um, you know, I do spend quite a bit, quite a bit of time running outside. I'm, I'm going to do a half marathon in Beijing this weekend, so that's something that I would do. Um, and I think that those, those are the times that you can think about, you know, what happened next, some of the long-term plans. But I do also enjoy, you know, meeting up with partners, customers, friends over a nice meal, having a nice glass of wine, and that's something that you can learn from them as well. I mean, I do enjoy talking to a lot of, you know, industry people from other industries as well, and and every, every conversation, you, you try to get a different perspective of, you know, uh, you know, what's important to them, and you can learn from them about their experience also."
"What is your advice to young people?"
"Look, I think, um, the world is evolving very, very fast, right? I do think that having the, you know, having the interest to learn about the latest developments is very important, right? I mean, we all talk about AI, right? How is AI going to change the job market in the future? How is AI going to change how people are doing things, uh, in the future? I think those are important, right? And I think that young people do need to catch up on the latest trends because if they don't, you know, if they don't catch up, then, um, you know, that, that they may face, you know, job security issues in the future, uh, they may, they may not be able to, um, you know, understand what the next stage of development is going to be. So, so I do know, I do think that, uh, young people do need to spend time understanding the latest trends. But at the same time, I think, um, uh, you know, as I mentioned previously, I do like to read about history. I do read, read like to read about what other businesses' success or failure, uh, because you can always learn something from history, right? Because, uh, there's going to be, you know, history always, as I, as I mentioned before, history always repeats itself. So there, there's something that you can learn. You know, I think one of our chairman's saying, uh, many years ago, which resonates a lot with me, was, 99% of the problems, there was a lot, there's already a solution out there. You just need to find it, and maybe with AI, you can find it fast enough."
"Well, you for sure have found a solution to very many problems, and, uh, big thanks for all your hard work. We are so happy to be shareholders in your group, and good luck with everything going forward."
"Thank you. Thanks for having me. Thank you."