Richard Yu

Richard Yu (Chinese: 余承东; pinyin: Yú Chéngdōng; born 1969) is a Chinese business executive and long-serving senior manager of Huawei, the Shenzhen-based telecommunications and electronics company. He is best known for building up Huawei's consumer hardware operations, particularly its smartphone business, and for leading the company's entry into the electric-vehicle market through its partnerships with automakers. Within Huawei he is an executive director of the board and chairs several internal committees, and he is widely known to the public through frequent media appearances and social-media posts.

Early life and education

According to Huawei's official biography and Chinese reference sources, Yu was born in 1969 in Huoqiu County, Anhui Province. Chinese encyclopedic accounts state that he was admitted to Northwestern Polytechnical University in 1988 after achieving the top science-stream score in his county, and that he later pursued graduate studies in wireless communications at Tsinghua University. Huawei's biography lists a master's degree from Tsinghua.

Career at Huawei

Yu joined Huawei in 1993. Sources describe him as having contributed to the development of the C&C08 digital switch, one of the company's early products, and as having led the launch of Huawei's main GSM products in 1997. The following year he reportedly took part in drafting 3G international standards. In 2008 he led the development of a fourth-generation base station.

His internal roles, as listed on Huawei's official site, have included 3G product director, vice president of wireless technical sales, president of the wireless network product line, president of the European region, chief strategy and marketing officer, and CEO of the consumer business group. He also chaired the board of the intelligent automotive solutions business unit.

In 2010 he moved to Huawei's terminal (device) business. Chinese reference accounts credit him with driving the transition of Huawei phones to a self-owned brand in 2012, and with a 2017 keynote on "smart internet" user experience.

Smartphone and consumer business

Yu's most prominent business achievement is generally credited to Huawei's smartphone division. The South China Morning Post reported that he led the company to become the world's largest smartphone vendor in the second quarter of 2020, a few months after the United States placed Huawei on its restricted entity list. That period coincided with severe restrictions on Huawei's access to advanced semiconductor manufacturing and US-designed components, which made the company's chip and operating-system strategy a central issue for its devices.

Under his leadership the consumer business developed its own operating system, HarmonyOS. At Huawei Developer Conference 2026 in June, Yu announced the public beta of HarmonyOS 7 and said that more than 66 million terminal devices were running HarmonyOS 6. The company said HarmonyOS was moving toward an agent-based architecture with built-in artificial-intelligence features.

In 2024 reports said Yu had stepped down as chief executive of the consumer business group and was made chairman, with He Gang succeeding him as CEO. Later reports, citing internal changes, said he had relinquished oversight of the smart-driving unit so that he could focus on the smartphone and HarmonyOS business. Huawei had not previously had a chairman for its device business, according to these reports. Huawei's official profile lists him as chairman of the consumer business group's board.

Automotive business

Huawei entered the car market in 2019 under Yu's leadership, initially through the AITO brand developed with the Chinese manufacturer Seres. The company established its Intelligent Automotive Solutions unit in 2019 and announced the AITO brand in December 2021. In 2023 Huawei consolidated its partnerships into the Harmony Intelligent Mobility Alliance (HIMA), a model in which Huawei provides product planning, design, marketing, software and hardware for automakers such as Seres, Chery, BAIC, JAC and SAIC, which manufacture and sell the vehicles. Huawei's involvement is confined to mainland China, according to the Harmony Intelligent Mobility Alliance's English Wikipedia entry.

In March 2023 the AITO brand was briefly rebranded as "Huawei Wenjie", and Yu personally directed that Huawei promotional material be removed from AITO stores from April 1, following guidance that Huawei should not appear as the vehicle maker. Under HIMA, Yu has been the public face of several brands, including AITO, Luxeed, Stelato and Maextro.

In September 2026 Yu said that from 2027 the Seres group would take the lead on product definition, brand marketing and channel management for AITO, while Huawei would continue to supply its HarmonyOS cockpit and its intelligent driving technology. Vehicles launched in 2026 would still be designed mainly by Huawei's team, and existing customers' rights were unaffected, he said.

Recent statements and positions (2026)

At an international media roundtable held in late September 2026 in Shenzhen, Yu described Huawei's strategy for its consumer business. He said Huawei's core hardware and software had become largely self-controlled, drawing on in-house chips, the HarmonyOS system and the domestic supply chain, and that the company had largely reduced its reliance on US technology. He also stated that Huawei's smartphone sales outside China had fallen to a few million units a year, and that the company was gradually trying to return to overseas markets, including Europe, by working with local carrier channels. These are the company's own characterisations, and independent assessments of them are limited.

Public profile

Yu is known in Chinese media for his outspoken style and for frequently making public claims about product performance and company plans; he is commonly nicknamed "Big Mouth" in online commentary. His public statements have sometimes drawn criticism from users, rivals and commentators, and some product timelines he has announced have been revised. Huawei's official biography and reports from major outlets are the most reliable sources for his current titles, which differ between sources: some English-language references describe him as chairman of the Huawei device business, while Huawei's own profile lists him as executive director, chairman of the Investment Review Board and chairman of the consumer business group's board.