Meet the ‘godfather’ of China’s smartphone industry

The success of four Chinese smartphone brands – Oppo and Vivo as well as recently established OnePlus and Realme – can be directly attributed to the guiding hand and investment savvy of reclusive billionaire entrepreneur, investor, and philanthropist Duan Yongping.

He is the founder and chairman of privately held BBK Electronics, a 24-year-old company based in the southern coastal city of Dongguan that now runs one of the world’s largest and most sophisticated electronics supply chains behind the production of a range of smartphones for the global market.

Duan Yongping / Photo credit: BBK Electronics

Duan, who will turn 58 years old next month, is widely regarded as the “godfather” of the Chinese smartphone industry for developing two brands, Oppo and Vivo, as large global players competing against the likes of Samsung Electronics, Apple, LG Electronics and mainland rival Huawei Technologies.

OnePlus and Realme, which are backed by BBK and other investors, appear to be the next big Chinese brands to conquer international markets.

Attempts to reach Duan and BBK were unsuccessful. The Chinese billionaire, who was interviewed by Bloomberg in 2017, was identified last year as an early investor in Pinduoduo, China’s third-largest ecommerce company, which was founded by his friend and protégé, Colin Huang Zheng. Duan’s net worth was estimated at 10 billion yuan (US$1.5 billion), according to the 2018 Hurun China Rich List.

In September last year, Duan also had a well-publicized conversation with Chinese students at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, where his family lives. Duan and wife Liu Xin, a former journalist, had set up their family’s Enlight Foundation to provide Chinese students with undergraduate scholarships and graduate fellowships at the university’s School of Engineering.

Duan first made international headlines near the end of June 2006, when he agreed to pay a then-record amount of US$620,100 in a bid on eBay to have a power lunch at a New York steakhouse with renowned billionaire investment guru Warren Buffett, the chairman and chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway.

“I’ve learned so much from Warren Buffett and his investment philosophy. I want a chance to say thank you,” Duan said in a South China Morning Post report in July 2006. Apart from his wife, Duan brought six friends to that lunch, including Huang.

Photo credit: Oppo

Duan was born in March 1961 into a modest family in Nanchang, capital of Jiangxi province in southeast China. In 1978, he entered Zhejiang University in the eastern city of Hangzhou, where he majored in wireless electronics engineering.

After a short stint as a teacher at the adult education center of the Beijing Radio Tube Factory, Duan pursued further studies at Chinese capital’s elite Renmin University of China, formerly known as People’s University, where he earned a master’s degree in economics in 1989.

That same year, he joined Zhongshan Yihua Group, located in the southern coastal province of Guangdong, to manage an ailing factory and turned it into a profitable business. He set up a unit that made cheap video game consoles, Subor Electronics Industry, where he served as chief executive.