What you need to know about Meng Wanzhou, the daughter of a Chinese tech founder whose arrest could set fire to US-China relations
Born in China in 1972, Meng Wanzhou is the daughter of Huawei's founder Ren Zhengfei and his first wife, Meng Jun. She is one of Ren's two daughters — the second, Annabel Yao, came from Ren's second of three marriages.
Meng also goes by Cathy or Sabrina, and took on her mother's maiden name (Meng) at a young age. The 46-year-old, who holds a masters in accounting from China's Huazhong University, joined Huawei not long after graduating college.
Source: Bloomberg
Meng first started at Huawei in 1993 answering phones. Since then, she has worked her way up through the company's finance department to her current position as chief financial officer. Meng also serves as deputy chairwoman on Huawei's board of directors, replacing her father — who previously held the position — in March 2018.
Source: CNN, Business Insider
Meng has four children and is married to Liu Xiaozong, a businessman who worked at Huawei for several years. The couple owns two homes in Vancouver, Canada, that have a combined value of more than $20 million. She's reportedly willing to take mortgages out on the properties to pay for her bail.
Meng reportedly suffers from a myriad of health issues that her lawyers argue could deteriorate while she's detained, according to court documents. The CFO is a thyroid cancer survivor who has hypertension, trouble sleeping, difficulty eating solid foods, and relies on daily drug treatments.
Source: Bloomberg
Meng's rise through the rankings of Huawei's leadership led many to speculate that Ren, the company's founder, was grooming his daughter to someday take the helm as CEO. However, Ren dashed any hopes of that in an internal email from 2013, where he wrote that "none of my family members possess these qualities," and they "will never be included in the sequence of successors."
Source: Bloomberg
- Read more on the arrest of Huawei's Meng Wanzhou:
- Here's everything you need to know about Huawei, the Chinese tech giant whose founder's daughter was arrested and could spark an all-out trade war
- An arrest, a debutante ball, and 3 marriages: Inside the insane lives of the super rich Huawei dynasty
- China summons US ambassador and warns of 'grave consequences' if Huawei's CFO is not released
- China has threatened the US with 'further action' if Huawei's CFO isn't freed
- The US wants to charge Huawei CFO with fraud related to trade sanctions, prosecutors say
- Chinese tech giant Huawei's CFO proves Trump's trade war is 'escalating to a new level'
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