Huawei touts growth in preannouncing 2013 results

Huawei doesn’t expect to officially announce results for 2013 until the second quarter of this year. But the tally so far looks good enough to crow about – so it has. The company says that global sales revenues will reach between CNY238 billion to CNY 240 billion ($39.33 billion to $39.66 billion) in 2013, an increase of about 8% (and 11.6% in U.S. dollars) on a year-on- year basis. Profits for the year should range between CNY28.6 billion and CNY29.4 billion ($4.7 billion to $4.86 billion).

The continuing troubles establishing its telecom business in the U.S. (see “U.S. House Intelligence Committee sees Huawei and ZTE as security threats” and "Huawei on U.S. market: Never mind") didn’t prevent Huawei from recording new business growth in its carrier network group, as well as its enterprise and consumer activities. More than 75% of the carrier network business group’s revenue in 2013 came from the world's top 50 telecom carriers, Huawei asserts. Meanwhile, the proportion of revenue from services and software in the carrier business increased to 37% in 2013, up 3% from 2012.

Huawei credits its investments in R&D for its success. “Every year for over the past 10 years, Huawei has invested more than 10% of sales revenue in innovation,” said CFO Cathy Meng via a company press release. “In 2013 alone, the company’s investment in R&D reached CNY33 billion ($5.5 billion), accounting for about 14% of our sales revenue.” The R&D investment was the largest in Huawei’s history.

Meanwhile, Huawei says it also improved operating efficiencies and reduced internal management and operating costs. For example, it shifted its operating model from function-centric to project-centric.

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