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I saw him build a tall building, I saw him entertain guests, and I saw his building collapse.

Recently, Forbes officially released the list of "China's Best CEOs 2024". Among them, 11 CEOs returned to the list, 15 were selected for the second consecutive year, and 24 were selected for the first time. There were also a record 6 CEOs born in the 1980s, which is three times the number of last year.

How many shopping mall truths are hidden behind the changes in a list?

Zhejiang business community achieved great results

Among the 50 companies on the list, the Yangtze River Delta region accounts for one third, with 18 companies from Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Anhui making the list, including 8 from Shanghai and Zhejiang, and 1 from Jiangsu and Anhui.

If we include two Zhejiang businessmen from outside the province, Yang Yuanqing of Lenovo Group and Zhu Zhaojiang of Transsion Holdings, there are a total of 10 Zhejiang businessmen on the list, accounting for 20%, ranking first in the country.

The fields involved by these 10 companies are also very broad, including the Internet, beverage consumption, daily necessities, electrical components and equipment, motor vehicle parts and equipment, environment and facility services, basic chemicals, industrial machinery, communications equipment and other business areas.

Zhejiang has always been China's most developed commercial province, supporting the development and growth of trade unions and legendary entrepreneurs who, with their vision and innovation, built business empires, accumulated staggering wealth, and promoted the progress of the entire Chinese economy.

Among the top ten best CEOs, there are two Zhejiang businessmen, namely Nongfu Spring CEO Zhong Shanshan and NetEase CEO Ding Lei.

Zhong Shanshan was born in Shaoxing, Zhejiang in 1954. Before selling water, he worked as a mason, carpenter, and reporter. He went to Hainan, planted mushrooms, and worked as a reporter. As he led Nongfu Spring to perform well in the consumer sector, he has also been firmly on the list of China's richest people.

Also worth noting is the list of Yang Weidong, Chairman and President of Satellite Chemistry. This is his second time on the list after 2022.

As the leader of the domestic light hydrocarbon industry chain, Satellite Chemistry is committed to becoming a low-carbon chemical new material technology company, deepening the promotion of "technological leadership" and "management leadership". The company plans to achieve R&D investment of 10 billion yuan, innovation incentives of 1 billion yuan, and a R&D team of 2,000 people within five years to solve a number of national "bottleneck" short board technologies.

With the gradual commissioning of light hydrocarbon integration projects, Satellite's hydrogen production capacity is expected to exceed 400,000 tons/year, making it the largest hydrogen energy supplier in East China.

"Cool male protagonists" gathered

What qualities does an excellent CEO need? Chen Chunhua, a well-known enterprise research expert, summarized four qualities:

First, they have a strong dream and sense of mission. Second, they have a strong understanding of the essence of business and the ability to control strategic variables. Third, they are particularly willing to accept challenges, eager to challenge and have the fighting spirit. Finally, they develop themselves and others.

"Today, we see that those excellent entrepreneurs and managers are really driven by mission and dream, so they are not easily disturbed by the external environment."

In order to boost morale and lift people's fighting spirit, "cool male protagonists" appear one after another on the road to chasing dreams.

Born in 1987, Wang Ning, CEO of Pop Mart, is the youngest self-made founder in the history of this list.

After Pop Mart went public, Wang Ning often mentioned, "We started with A, tried B in the middle, but succeeded because of C, and finally we may become great with D."

"Many years ago, we described our brand vision in our prospectus: we hope to become a globally influential trend culture and entertainment company. This has not changed."

Ye Guofu of MINISO is a master manager who writes letters to employees very diligently, always talking about passion and persistence.

"MINISO's striver culture is not a culture of sacrifice or hardship, but encourages high-quality and valuable creation. When we select talents, we first select people with striver spirit, and secondly, people who are capable of creating value. The two complement each other and are indispensable. Thirdly, we should not let strivers suffer losses. As an enterprise, we should make strivers happier and inspire their love from the heart."

The biggest "happy male protagonist" is none other than Xiaomi's Lei Jun.

On the evening of July 19, Lei Jun's annual speech was held at the Beijing Shougang Park Ice Hockey Arena, and the scene was crowded. In front of the giant screen printed with the theme of this speech - "Courage", Lei Jun walked out quickly and waved to everyone. For a full three hours of live broadcast, the number of online users in Lei Jun's Douyin live broadcast room remained above 100,000.

When Lei Jun said, "Xiaomi SU7 is a dream car designed and built for strivers," the audience burst into applause. "Continuous exploration, continuous growth, continuous victory, courage, is our best response to this era."

In addition, Lei Jun's "rebuttal" to the "male protagonist of a cool article" is also full of chicken soup: In fact, life has never been a cool article, but a series of difficult breakthroughs.

How big is the difference between China and foreign countries?

Coincidentally, not long ago, Barron's released its list of top CEOs for 2024 (sorted alphabetically by last name):

More than half of the CEOs on the list represent companies that are involved in the current AI investment boom to some extent—selling chips, buying chips and providing computing services, and applying algorithms to advertising or pricing.

The best example is Nvidia founder Jen-Hsun Huang, who focuses on integrating hardware with software and has fostered a large community of developers and user-experts.

At Nvidia, Huang has three architecture teams working simultaneously: one responsible for current chips, another for next year's upgrades, and a third for future chips. Coupled with a huge development budget, Nvidia is already years ahead of its competitors in technology. Recently, Nvidia has become the company with the highest market value in the United States, reaching the top of the artificial intelligence market.

Among the legendary figures who have promoted the development of AI technology, in addition to Huang Renxun, there is another heavyweight who is as famous as him, AMD CEO Lisa Su, who is known as the "Queen of Chips".

Su Zifeng was born in Tainan, Taiwan Province, China, and immigrated to the United States at the age of 3. She obtained a bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degree in electrical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Now she is in charge of chip giant AMD, with an annual salary of up to 58.5 million US dollars. This figure is not only unmatched by countless industry leaders, but also the best among female CEOs in the world.

In contrast, the proportion of consumer companies in the list of China's best CEOs has increased significantly.

According to the list, the top ten best CEOs in China ranked by Forbes are Pinduoduo co-CEOs Chen Lei and Zhao Jiazhen, Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun, CATL CEO Zeng Yuqun, BYD CEO Wang Chuanfu, Ctrip Group CEO Sun Jie, Midea Group CEO Fang Hongbo, Sungrow Power CEO Cao Renxian, Haier Smart Home CEO Li Huagang, Nongfu Spring CEO Zhong Shanshan and NetEase CEO Ding Lei.

Every era has its own entrepreneurs. No one can go against the trend of the times. It can be expected that in the next few years, the list of China's best CEOs will undergo earth-shaking changes.