Sina Technology exclusively learned that Li Weixing, a member of Xiaomi's founding team and former vice-chairman and secretary-general of Xiaomi's technical committee has resigned.
Li Weixing is the No. 12 employee of Xiaomi. On April 6, 2010, on the day of the establishment of Xiaomi, Li Weixing was among the 13 people who drank millet porridge with Lei Jun. He was in charge of MIUI development in the early days and later transferred to the technical committee.
Of the 13 people, 4 are co-founders and 9 are founding team members. Li Weixing was the first of the 9 to leave, and the other 8 are still working.
In addition, Xiaomi is currently in turmoil of layoffs. It is reported that Xiaomi plans to lay off 10% of its employees. An internal employee revealed to Sina Technology that in Xiaomi's 2021 performance score, it is mandatory that 10% of employees in all departments must have a performance of C, and if the performance is C twice, they will be dismissed.
In response to the rumors of layoffs, Xiaomi denied to the media, saying that there have been no layoffs since the start-up, and it is still recruiting talents.
From core to fringe to virtual duty?
The story of starting a business and drinking millet porridge has always been talked about by Lei Jun.
On April 6, 2010, Lei Jun and 12 founding employees had a bowl of millet porridge together in Baofu Temple Bridge Yingu Building, and the millet company was officially established.
In the group photo of the above-mentioned founding team members, there are not only co-founders such as Lin Bin, Li Wanqiang, and Huang Jiangji, but also early start-up employees such as Li Weixing and Sun Peng.
After graduating from Sun Yat-sen University, Li Weixing worked at Microsoft for several years, engaged in the research and development of Windows Phone software. Joining Xiaomi was also introduced by Lin Bin, its leader at Microsoft. After meeting and chatting with Lei Jun, he decided to follow Lei Jun to cut his salary and start a business.
Li Weixing was a core technical member of Xiaomi's early MIUI system development and was later promoted to the vice president of MIUI. Its relatively formal move to the foreground was in the first structural adjustment after Xiaomi went public.
In September 2018, Lei Jun announced Xiaomi's organizational restructuring and personnel appointments in an internal email. This is the first major adjustment after Xiaomi's listing, and it is also the biggest organizational change since Xiaomi's establishment.
This structural adjustment involves a number of co-founders and middle and senior management from top to bottom. On the one hand, the Group Staff Department and the Group Organization Department were newly established to further enhance the management functions of the headquarters; on the other hand, four business departments including the TV Department, Ecological Chain Department, MIUI Department, and Interactive Entertainment Department were reorganized into ten new business departments. A large number of young executives born in the 1980s came to the front.
Li Weixing is one of the young executives who have been promoted. At that time, Xiaomi set up four Internet business departments, of which the Internet department was responsible for the core experience of MIUI, and Li Weixing served as the general manager and reported directly to CEO Lei Jun.
However, since then, Xiaomi has made several adjustments in the structure of the Internet business department, and Li Weixing has gradually faded out of MIUI's core management.
In February 2019, Li Weixing was appointed as the general manager of the fourth Internet department, mainly responsible for the TV version of MIUI, etc. The general manager of the first Internet department is Jin Fan, and both report to the CEO; in December 2020, Xiaomi integrated multiple independent Internet business departments, and newly established three software and experience departments, Internet business departments, and business middle and Taiwan departments. In the first-level department, Jin Fan, Ma Ji, and Qiu Ruiheng are the general managers of the department and report directly to CEO Lei Jun; in the structural adjustment in November 2021, the software and experience department and the mobile phone department system software department will be merged into the mobile phone department software department, the IoT platform department was merged into the software department of the mobile phone department, and Jin Fan served as the general manager of the software department of the mobile phone department.
And Li Weixing was transferred to the technical committee after the integration of the MIUI Internet business department in 2020, serving as the vice-chairman and secretary-general of the technical committee, and turned to the chairman of the technical committee (first Cui Baoqiu, now Ye Hangjun) to report.
At present, Li Weixing has left Xiaomi, and the specific reason for his departure is unknown. A Xiaomi employee commented on this, "The vice-chairman of the technical committee is a bit like a virtual position, but as a founding team member, he must have been financially free."
Li Weixing's personal Weibo was very active in communicating with users when he was in charge of MIUI, but stopped updating in early 2020. On the ninth anniversary of Xiaomi's establishment in April 2019, he also posted a Weibo with emotion: "When I joined Xiaomi, I really didn't expect Xiaomi to overcome so many difficulties, I didn't expect Xiaomi to have such a huge impact, and I didn't expect me to It's going to last that long."
It is worth noting that with the launch of Xiaomi and entering a new stage of development, the number of founding team members who drank millet porridge with Lei Jun is decreasing. Among the 13 people who drank millet porridge at that time, in addition to the four co-founders of Lei Jun, Lin Bin, Li Wanqiang, and Huang Jiangji, there were also Li Weixing, Sun Peng, Fan Dian, Liu Xinyu, Wang Haizhou, Li Ming, Qu Heng, Qin Zhifan and Guan Yingzhi. 9 founding team members.
Among them, co-founder Huang Jiangji (employee No. 4) left in 2018, and co-founder Li Wanqiang (employee No. 3) left in 2019; Li Weixing was the first to leave Xiaomi among the 9 founding team members, and the other 8 are still at present Xiaomi works in various positions.
10% of employees are forced to hit C?
In fact, Li Weixing's departure also coincides with a major adjustment of Xiaomi's various business departments.
In November 2021, Xiaomi announced internally that its independent e-commerce platform, Xiaomi Youpin, will be integrated with Xiaomi's retail business in China. Xiaomi said that after being merged into China, Xiaomi Youpin and Xiaomi Mall will continue to serve different consumer groups respectively, and their business forms and audiences will not change.
But after the merger is the change. In January this year, Youpin Youyu, a subsidiary of Xiaomi Youpin, announced that due to business adjustments, Youpin Youyu would cease operations in March. In addition to Xiaomi Youpin and Xiaomi Mall, several business units of Xiaomi will be integrated by the end of 2021.
An internal Xiaomi employee told Sina Technology that he heard internal news of layoffs at the end of 2021. "After the integration, the overlap of some functional personnel and the adjustment of business direction are inevitable."
According to Sina Technology, Xiaomi's performance is divided into four levels: S, A, B, and C. The employee revealed that in the performance scoring before the Spring Festival, the company notified all departments that 10% of the employees must have a performance of C, and if the performance was C twice, they would be dismissed. What is different from previous years is that previously, employees who have left or are about to leave can be allowed to recite Performance C, but this time it is no longer allowed to do so.
In addition to the reasons for internal integration, another Xiaomi employee believes that in the current Internet environment, even if Xiaomi really lays off staff, it is easy to understand. At an internal meeting before the Spring Festival, a high-level prediction for 2022 was to "get ready for winter." The executive said that Xiaomi is facing external pressures such as geopolitics, policy regulation, and industry competition, as well as uncertainty in the development of its main business and new businesses.
The so-called main business is Xiaomi's mobile phone business. At present, Xiaomi is vigorously promoting the high-end of its mobile phones. Lei Jun proposed the goal of benchmarking Apple, the world's first in three years, and the domestic high-end first in three years. However, the above-mentioned employees believe that there is still a big gap between Xiaomi and Apple in the high-end market.
According to IDC data, in the global smartphone market in 2021, Xiaomi ranks third with a market share of 14.1%, and Apple ranks second with 17.4%, but Apple performed well in the fourth quarter, ranking first in market share; From the domestic situation, in the fourth quarter of 2021, Apple ranked first with a market share of 20.6%, and Xiaomi ranked fifth.
In terms of new business, it is mainly the Xiaomi car business that will be established in 2021. Lei Jun has given the goal of mass production in 2024. Xiaomi employees revealed to Sina Technology that they thought that Xiaomi cars would use a lot of Xiaomi's existing technology, but in fact, it was not. For example, the intelligent voice system of the car, Xiaomi already has its own Xiaoai classmate, and the automobile department is also developing its own products. "To engage in an internal competition, whoever does it well will use it."
It is worth noting that Xiaomi’s auto business is currently in the start and investment stage, and it is directly wholly owned by Xiaomi, which will undoubtedly put pressure on Xiaomi’s financial data. Employees speculate that Xiaomi's auto business may develop independently in the future due to factors such as product development and financial data.
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