Huawei hosted an international media roundtable in Shenzhen, where Richard Yu, Executive Director, Chairman of the Investment Review Board, and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Consumer BG, detailed the company’s consumer business strategy and the HarmonyOS ecosystem. The event, reported by Media OutReach Newswire, highlighted Huawei’s intensified focus on continuous innovation as it navigates a complex global technology landscape.
Central to Huawei’s competitive edge is its massive research and development spending. Between 2007 and 2025, the company invested more than CNY1.8 trillion in R&D, with the annual allocation rising from roughly 10% of revenue in early years to over 20% recently. That investment has produced a broad patent portfolio and breakthroughs like the LogicFolding technology under the Tau Scaling Law. Unveiled by He Tingbo in May, LogicFolding vertically stacks logic layers and uses high-density interconnects to shorten critical paths and reduce latency. The technology debuted on the Mate XT 2 tri-fold phone and now powers the Kirin 9050 Pro chip in the Mate 90 series, enabling the devices to run a 30-billion-parameter on-device AI model.
Yu confirmed that more Huawei phones will adopt LogicFolding chips in the future, though he acknowledged that advanced semiconductor production capacity in China remains tight and cannot yet meet rapidly growing demand. He noted that memory price increases have somewhat limited smartphone sales volume, but overall capacity is sufficient for current shipment needs. The Mate 90 series, which launched with the Kirin 9050 Pro, delivers 31% higher overall performance than the previous generation. The chip integrates Huawei-designed components including the Balong modem, image signal processor, mobile security processor, Lingxi CPU, Maleoon GPU, and a Da Vinci architecture NPU.
HarmonyOS, Huawei’s homegrown operating system launched in 2019, now runs on more than 90 million devices, including smartphones, PCs, and tablets. Yu expects that figure to surpass 100 million by the end of this year. The ecosystem already includes over 450,000 apps and services, 11 million registered developers globally, and more than 23,000 app innovation partners. He expressed special thanks to partners and developers and said Huawei is considering gradually bringing HarmonyOS to the global market.
On globalization, Yu recalled strong past collaborations with companies from the US, Europe, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. Since 2019, Huawei has relied on homegrown technologies to design its own operating system, develop basic tools and software, and establish a domestic supply chain. In 2023, it resumed domestic manufacturing of smartphone chips, and with HarmonyOS, the company says it has basically eliminated dependence on US technologies. While Huawei’s global smartphone market share was once No. 1, it now sells only several million units outside China annually. Yu revealed that Huawei is trying to return overseas step by step, citing wearables where it is No. 1 globally, fast-growing TWS earphones, strong HarmonyOS tablet performance, and CPE mobile routers that connect remote and rural areas.
In AI, Yu discussed the Ascend compute foundation, openPangu large models, intelligent driving capabilities, and HarmonyOS Celia. He said Huawei is using AI to improve network operations and maintenance, aiming to boost productivity and convenience for enterprises worldwide. For the full Q&A session, the transcript is available at https://www.apmultimedianewsroom.com/multimedia-newsroom/continuous-innovation-securing-our-competitive-edge-through-technological-breakthroughs.
