He Xiangjian
| He Xiangjian | |
|---|---|
| Born | October 5, 1942 (age 84) Shunde, Foshan, Guangdong, China |
| Nationality | Chinese |
| Education | No formal schooling |
| Occupation | Businessman, art collector |
| Company | Midea Group |
| Title | Founder and former chairman, Midea Group |
| Net worth | US$28.8 billion (2021) |
| Children | 3, including He Jianfeng |
He Xiangjian (何享健; born 5 October 1942) is a Chinese businessman, the founder and former chairman of the Midea Group, one of the largest manufacturers of household appliances in the world. In September 2021 the Bloomberg Billionaires Index estimated his net worth at 28.8 billion dollars, placing him 51st in the world.
He began in 1968 with 23 neighbours and 5,000 yuan, making plastic bottle caps in a village workshop in Guangdong. The enterprise that grew from it now produces air conditioners, refrigerators, washing machines and industrial robots, and owns the German robotics manufacturer KUKA. He handed operational control to a professional manager rather than a family member in 2012, an unusual decision among Chinese founders, and has since devoted much of his attention to philanthropy and to the art museum he founded.
Early life
He Xiangjian was born on 5 October 1942 in Shunde, part of Foshan in Guangdong province, a district of the Pearl River Delta that later became one of the densest concentrations of light manufacturing anywhere in the world.
He had no opportunity to attend school. He worked as a farmer and then as a factory apprentice, and the absence of formal education is a detail he has referred to frequently in later years in connection with his support for schools and universities.
Career
Founding Midea
In May 1968, in the town of Beijiao in Shunde, He gathered 23 local residents and raised 5,000 yuan, then equivalent to about 730 dollars, to establish a production team making glass bottles and plastic lids. The venture was formed under the collective enterprise arrangements of the period, and it manufactured components rather than finished goods: bottle caps first, then parts for vehicles.
The decisive shift came in 1980, when the enterprise began making electric fans, moving from components to complete consumer products. He registered the Midea brand in 1981, and in April 1985 established the Midea Air Conditioning Equipment Factory, entering the category that became the group's largest business.
Growth
The timing aligned closely with the growth of Chinese household incomes. Demand for electric fans, then air conditioners, refrigerators and washing machines rose through the 1980s and 1990s as urban households acquired appliances for the first time, and Midea expanded its product range to meet successive waves of that demand.
He pushed the company through two structural transitions that distinguished it from many contemporaries. The first was ownership: in 1992 Midea became one of the earliest collective enterprises in China to undertake a shareholding reform, and it listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange in 1993, one of the first township enterprises to do so. A management buyout in 2000 converted it fully into a privately controlled company.
The second was management. He devolved authority to divisional managers early and consistently, operating a decentralised structure in which product divisions ran with considerable independence. He is quoted within the company as saying that he preferred to delegate rather than to supervise, and the approach produced a deep bench of professional managers.
Midea expanded internationally through acquisition, most significantly with the purchase of a controlling stake in KUKA, the German industrial robotics manufacturer, for approximately 4.5 billion euros in 2016, and of the Japanese appliance business of Toshiba in the same year. The group completed a secondary listing in Hong Kong in 2024.
Succession
He stepped down from operational leadership in 2012, handing the chairmanship of the listed company to Fang Hongbo, a professional manager who had joined Midea in 1992 and risen through its divisions. The decision to pass control to a manager rather than to his son He Jianfeng was widely noted in China, where family succession is the norm among first-generation private enterprises, and is frequently cited as a reason for Midea's subsequent stability. The family retains a controlling interest through Midea Holding.
Philanthropy
He has been among the largest private donors in China. In 2017 he established the He's Charity Foundation with a donation of shares and cash reported at approximately six billion yuan, directed principally to medical care, education and poverty relief in Guangdong. He has funded hospitals, schools and university programmes in Shunde and the wider Foshan area, and contributed substantially to relief efforts following natural disasters.
He is a significant collector of Chinese art. In 2020 he opened the He Art Museum in Shunde, a privately funded non-profit institution housed in a circular building designed by the Pritzker Prize-winning architect Tadao Ando. The museum holds Chinese modern and contemporary work alongside international pieces and was conceived as a cultural institution for the Pearl River Delta rather than for one of China's major art centres.
Controversies
2020 kidnapping attempt
On 14 June 2020 a group of men broke into He's residence in Foshan in an attempted kidnapping and extortion. His son He Jianfeng escaped by swimming across a river and alerted the police. He Xiangjian was rescued unharmed the same night, and five suspects were arrested. Chinese courts subsequently convicted and sentenced the perpetrators.
The case received extensive coverage in China and internationally, and prompted discussion of the personal security of the country's wealthiest individuals and of the visibility of private fortunes accumulated over the reform period.
KUKA acquisition
Midea's 2016 purchase of KUKA produced significant political resistance in Germany and at the European level. German officials, including the then economy minister Sigmar Gabriel, sought unsuccessfully to arrange a European counter-bid, arguing that industrial robotics was a strategically sensitive technology. The transaction proceeded after Midea gave undertakings on employment, plant locations and data protection through 2023.
The episode became a reference point in European policy debate and contributed directly to the tightening of German and European Union foreign investment screening rules for acquisitions in critical technology sectors. KUKA's performance under Midea ownership subsequently disappointed, and the German chief executive left in 2018, developments cited by both critics and defenders of the original decision.
Labour and manufacturing practices
Midea has faced periodic scrutiny over conditions and working hours in its manufacturing operations, in common with large Chinese appliance manufacturers generally. The company has stated that it complies with Chinese labour law and the requirements of its international customers. Automation of its own plants, accelerated by the KUKA acquisition, has reduced the size of its production workforce substantially.
Product safety
Midea and its subsidiaries have issued recalls in several markets, including a large United States recall of dehumidifiers sold under multiple brand names over fire risk, the costs of which the company recognised in its accounts. Such recalls are a recurring feature of the industry, and Midea's scale as an original equipment manufacturer for other brands means that products it makes reach consumers under names that do not identify it.
Personal life
He has three children. His son He Jianfeng holds interests in the family's investment vehicles and sits on the board of Midea Holding. He lives in Shunde, in the district where he founded the company and where he has concentrated his philanthropy, and has maintained a low public profile throughout his career, rarely giving interviews or appearing at public events.
See also
References