Huawei

Huawei started in 1987 as a telephone switchboard reseller in Shenzhen. Ren Zhengfei had no telecom background. He was ex-military with no capital. He borrowed equipment and sold it. Within five years, his team reversed engineered a switch and built their own. Within 10, they competed with Ericsson and Alcatel in rural China. Most companies in that position would have stayed regional. Instead, Huawei made a ruthless bet. They invested 30% of revenue into R&D every year for three decades. They hired thousands of engineers from abroad and built laboratories in Silicon Valley, Munich, Stockholm, Seoul. They sent teams to Africa to understand customer needs.