Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei Technologies reported a 144.5% surge in net profit for 2023, reaching 87 billion yuan ($12.25 billion), as the company's smartphone and automotive businesses picked up steam. The impressive growth marks Huawei's strongest earnings performance since 2019, signaling a successful rebound from the impact of U.S. sanctions imposed on the company.
Huawei's revenue also saw a 9.6% year-on-year increase, reaching 704.2 billion yuan ($99.18 billion) in 2023. The company attributed the profit gains to higher quality operations, sales of some businesses, and better product offerings.
The consumer business, which includes Huawei's handset division, played a significant role in the company's resurgence, growing 17.3% to 251.49 billion yuan. Huawei made a comeback in the smartphone market with the quiet release of its Mate 60 Pro in China in late August 2023. Despite U.S. restrictions on Huawei's access to high-end tech from American suppliers since 2019, the Mate 60 Pro offers download speeds associated with 5G, thanks to an advanced semiconductor chip.
The launch of the Mate 60 Pro helped boost Huawei's sales in China, with the company's smartphone shipments in the country surging by 47% year-on-year in the fourth quarter, according to data from Canalys. This put Huawei in fourth place by market share, ahead of Xiaomi, while Apple maintained its first place position with 6% year-on-year growth in shipments.
Huawei's intelligent automobile solutions business also saw significant growth, with revenue increasing by 128.1% from a year ago to 4.7 billion yuan. The company sells software and other technology to car companies and has partnered with an automaker for the Aito electric car brand. Earlier this month, Richard Yu, the managing director and chairman of Huawei's smart car solutions, announced that the unit would likely turn a profit from April after losing billions of yuan in the past year, according to local media reports.
The company's core ICT infrastructure business remained stable, while its cloud business grew by more than a fifth, generating revenue of 55.3 billion yuan.
The strong financial results come after Huawei stabilized its business in 2022, following a plunge of more than 28% in sales in 2021. The company's revenue grew by 0.9% to 642.3 billion yuan in 2022, although net profit fell by 69%, the largest drop on record, due to rising commodity prices, China's pandemic controls, and growing research and development spend.
Despite the challenges posed by U.S. sanctions, Huawei has managed to overcome the obstacles and achieve significant growth. At a launch event last year, Meng Wanzhou, Huawei's CFO and the daughter of the company's founder, announced that Huawei was no longer in crisis mode.
Rotating chairman Ken Hu commented on the company's performance in a press release, stating, "We've been through a lot over the past few years. But through one challenge after another, we've managed to grow."
As Huawei continues to diversify its business and expand into new areas such as smart car components, the company's strong financial performance in 2023 demonstrates its resilience and ability to adapt to changing market conditions. With its consumer, cloud, and automotive segments showing promising growth, Huawei appears well-positioned to maintain its upward trajectory in the coming years, despite the ongoing challenges posed by U.S. sanctions.
