SHENZHEN, March 28 (Xinhua) -- China's telecommunication giant Huawei maintained solid operations throughout 2021, achieving 113.7 billion yuan (about 17.8 billion U.S. dollars) in net profits, up 75.9 percent year on year, and 636.8 billion yuan in revenue, the company said Monday.
"Overall, our performance was in line with forecast," Huawei's Rotating Chairman, Guo Ping, said at its 2021 annual report press conference held in Shenzhen, south China's Guangdong Province.
"Our carrier business remained stable, our enterprise business experienced steady growth, and our consumer business quickly expanded into new domains," said Guo.
According to the report, in 2021, Huawei's carrier business generated 281.5 billion yuan in revenue, and by working with carriers and partners around the world, the company signed more than 3,000 commercial contracts for industrial 5G applications.
Over the period, Huawei's enterprise business grew rapidly, generating 102.4 billion yuan in revenue. Over 700 cities and 267 Fortune Global 500 companies have chosen Huawei as their digital transformation partner and the company now works with more than 6,000 service and operation partners around the world.
Meanwhile, its consumer business generated 243.4 billion yuan in revenue last year and continued to see steady sales growth in smart wearables, smart screens, true wireless stereo (TWS) earbuds, and Huawei Mobile Services (HMS).
"Despite a revenue decline in 2021, our ability to make a profit and generate cash flows is increasing, and we are more capable of dealing with uncertainty," Meng Wanzhou, Huawei's chief financial officer, said at the press conference.
The annual report shows that the company's cash flow from operating activities dramatically increased in 2021, amounting to 59.7 billion yuan.
The company made a record R&D expenditure of 142.7 billion yuan in 2021, representing 22.4 percent of its total revenue and bringing its total R&D expenditure over the past 10 years to over 845 billion yuan.
In 2021, Huawei also focused on building out its openEuler, MindSpore, and HarmonyOS ecosystems based on the principles of open collaboration and shared growth. Over eight million developers are currently using Huawei's open platforms, open-source software, and development tools, according to the report.
"Moving forward, Huawei will advance its journey of digitalization, intelligent transformation, and low carbon," said Guo. "Relying on talent, scientific research, and an innovative spirit, we will continuously increase investment to reshape our paradigms for fundamental theories, architecture, and software, and build our long-term competitiveness." ■
