Accelerate the Digital and Intelligent Transformations of SMEs in APAC with Partners

The digital economy in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region is dynamic and rapidly expanding, with small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) at the core of this growth. Flourishing on the fertile soil of APAC's diverse economic landscapes and expeditious technological advancements, SMEs are given ample opportunities to innovate and significantly contribute to employment and economic output across the region. In ASEAN, there are approximately 70 million micro, small, and medium enterprises, accounting for 85% of employment, 44.8% of GDP, and 18% of national exports. 

To achieve sustainable growth and fully unlock the region's market potential, embracing digital and intelligent transformation is essential for SMEs—it's not just an option but a necessity. Over the next five years, it is anticipated that more than 90% of SMEs will attain core competitiveness through digital transformation. This significant shift is expected to generate a market opportunity exceeding one hundred billion USD in the global Information and Communications Technology (ICT) sector. 

Regional Governments' Focus on Supporting SMEs' Digital Transformation

APAC, with its significant number of unicorns and SMEs, places digital transformation at the forefront of national agendas to accelerate the growth of the digital economy. Recognized as the world's third-largest internet-based economy, ASEAN's digital economy was valued at approximately USD 300 billion in 2022. Projections suggest that it could reach USD 1 trillion by 2030, underscoring the tremendous potential for enterprises of all sizes in the region.

As we enter an era marked by advanced AI technologies and large industry models, governments in the region are prioritizing intelligent and digital transformation by developing digital infrastructure, enhancing service efficiency, and promoting advanced technologies. These initiatives emphasize stimulating innovation, improving digital literacy, and fostering talent development across all societal segments. 

Efforts are also focused on establishing strategic partnerships between governments and industries to bolster research and innovation, supporting SMEs and start-ups, and enhancing global competitiveness. This partnership aims to define essential digital skills and support AI development and talent cultivation, seeking to nurture a pool of future digital leaders. These concerted efforts are instrumental in shaping a workforce equipped with the necessary digital competencies and skills for the future.

Building a Robust Partner System for Joint Development Across Three Markets

Facing this massive opportunity, Huawei is prepared to accelerate the SMEs' digital and intelligent transformation, revolutionizing industry standards. To better support SMEs in their digital transition, Huawei as a company with over 30 years of experience in the ICT field, initiated a transformative shift in commercial market and distribution business strategies at the beginning of 2023, with a renewed focus and investment scheme.

Last April, Huawei officially released our enterprise strategies for 3 types of markets, namely the Named Account (NA) market, the commercial market, and the distribution business in the Asia Pacific region. With the support of partners and customers, our investments have yielded initial results in 2023. Overall, enterprise business in APAC has achieved rapid revenue growth, with commercial and distribution businesses seeing even greater increases of more than 30%, bringing in more partners, more customers, and greater business performance. The initial results underscore our commitment to supporting our SME customers through a partner-centric approach with continuous support and investment for our partners.

Central to Huawei's strategy in the commercial market and distribution business, are our reliable network of partners worldwide. We have developed a robust "Partner + Huawei" system in the APAC region. We have defined two categories of partners: 

• Acceleration Partners: Partners that focus on driving sales growth; For this type of partners, we operate on the principle of "the more contributions, the more rewards."
• Association Partners: Partners that offer services that complement Huawei's capabilities, and we ensure that the stronger their capability, the more opportunities we provide for them. 

This year we continue to explore ways to jointly accelerate the digital and intelligent transformation of SMEs in APAC with our partners, winning opportunities together in 3 markets:

• For NA market, our strategy is to work with partners and go deep into their business scenarios, and create joint vertical industry solutions. 
• For Commercial market, our strategy is to build a robust partner-led business mode, through enhancing supports to our partners to expand more customers together. 
• For Distribution business, our strategy is to stay subcontractor-centric and build a thriving distribution partner system.  

With partners at the core, Huawei continuously optimize the sales and service systems that support partners, provide support for partners from multiple aspects, including R&D, marketing, sales, supply, and services. Through the upgrade of policies, tools, and products and solutions, Huawei will work together with partners to help SME succeed.

Comprehensive Support for Partners in the SME Market through Three Dimensions

1. Marketable Products and Solutions

As an industry-leading ICT solution provider, Huawei continuously innovate to develop more marketable products and solutions for SMEs based on industry application scenarios.

Competitive products and solutions are the key for business success. We've recognized that customers in sectors like education and healthcare often face simpler business scenarios that require more lightweight products and solutions. We support our partners, by making our products more serviceable, open, unique, and marketable. aiming to make them the preferred choice for our partners.

In the commercial market, we have developed over 30 tailor-made, scenario-based marketable solutions for commercial market customers globally, and identified 11 HOT solutions specifically for our APAC regional market. These hot scenario-based solutions are now comprehensively packaged and ready for delivery by our partners across the region. Beyond these scenario-based solutions, Huawei has released 130 products for the commercial market, encompassing data communication, optical network, data storage, and intelligent collaboration products to cover diverse industries. 

In the distribution business, we have launched 21 new products this year under HUAWEI eKit brand, designed to assist APAC SMEs in their digital transformation and intelligent upgrade. HUAWEI eKit products and IT platform are developed to make it easy to buy and sell, easy to install and maintain, easy to learn and use for our distributors and customers.

At the same time, to meet local customer requirements and incubate local solutions, we operate 10 OpenLabs globally, including two in APAC region: one in Singapore and another in Bangkok. Huawei OpenLab serves as pivotal technical platform where we jointly develop innovative solutions with partners, adapt industry solutions, and strengthen core solution capabilities. To date, we have completed over 200 ISV collaborations, certified more than 60 solution partners, and released over 80 joint solutions. These solutions cater to various sectors, including Smart Education, Intelligent Campus, Finance, Auto Traffic Incident Detection, Mobile Surveillance, and Dispatching.

2. Partner Incentives and Policies

To support the partner-led business development, Huawei initiated an end-to-end (E2E) process transformation last year. With the aim to construct a partner-centric ecosystem, we have set up dedicated department to support the customers and partners in the commercial market and distribution business. This model provides our partners with Huawei technical training, joint marketing initiatives, and opportunities to engage with millions of SMEs.

For example, we have enhanced our support for partners by increasing incentives in the Market Development Fund (MDF), Joint Marketing Fund (JMF), Demo Support, and more by up to 50%. This is to encourage our partners to conduct more workshops, industry events, and social media marketing campaigns, thereby generating more business leads.

Training remains a critical requirement from our partners. In 2024, Huawei APAC has increased investment in partner enablement by over 40%. We are enhancing localized training, increasing the number of HALP Instructors, and expanding both onsite and remote learning opportunities. By the end of this year, we aim to train 400 experts and cultivate over 1,000 gold seeds in the region. We will persistently update our training materials to better assist our regional partners.

For supply and logistics, we are optimizing the support by defining different products tracks to provide different Leadtime to cater for the market demands.

3. IT Platforms and Tools

We continue to optimize IT equipment and provide partners with more comprehensive, open, efficient, and collaborative IT digital tools. 

• The Huawei partner official website and "Huawei ePlus" app are readily available for all types of partners;
• The Huawei "eFly" platform is designed especially for commercial partner. Partners are able to access to all Huawei commercial products and solutions, successful cases from the app to expand sales. 
• HUAWEI eKit supports the efficient operations of distribution partners through its digital platforms—the HUAWEI eKit official website and app. 

Jointly Accelerating Digital and Intelligent Transformation

Success is best, when its shared! Huawei collaboratively exploring the expansive SME market in APAC with our partners. Committed to advancing digitalization across the region, we are dedicated to becoming a key contributor to the digital economy of Asia-Pacific. 

Faced with the vast SME market in APAC, we aim to join hands with partners to seize tremendous opportunities, create more value for customers across industries and accelerate towards a digital and intelligent world.