Huawei staff arrive at new mega-campus, hub of China’s tech drive

The sprawling research and development complex is set to play an important role in the nation’s push towards self-reliance

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Huawei’s new research hub on the outskirts of Shanghai. Photo: Wency Chen

Published: 7:00am, 25 Oct 2024Updated: 10:28am, 25 Oct 2024

Huawei Technologies has opened a massive campus in a suburb of Shanghai, which serves as a base to promote innovations for China’s technology self-sufficiency drive, as the company demonstrates its resilience under US sanctions.

The Lianqiu Lake campus, which boasts a floor area more than 10 times larger than that of Alphabet’s Googleplex headquarters in Mountain View, California, is set to house around 35,000 researchers, according to Huawei.

While the first batch of employees arrived on October 14, only two blocks were occupied when the Post paid a visit this week, leaving most of the spacious complex empty.

Some 20,000 employees are expected to arrive around Lunar New Year in February, with the workforce growing to 30,000 by the end of 2026, according to a report from Chinese media outlet The Paper, citing a district official.

Huawei did not respond to an inquiry on when the new centre will be fully staffed.

The new complex is expected to house 35,000 researchers when fully staffed, according to Huawei. Photo: Wency Chen

The 2 million-square-metre (21.5 million-square-foot) research and development centre is set to play an important role for Huawei – which already has campuses in Dongguan and Shenzhen in southern Guangdong province – as well as for China, which is pushing for breakthroughs in chips and other areas.