Qihoo CEO Pledges 10% Stake to Encourage Staff Entrepreneurship
iFeng Tech, 1/27/16
Zhou Hongyi, CEO of Chinese internet services and security software provider Qihoo 360, (NYSE: QIHU) recently announced at an annual company meeting that he will use a 10% stake in the company that he currently controls to recruit and reward future company partners, including technical leaders and core management personnel, to encourage entrepreneurship among Qihoo 360's employees.
The 10% stake includes a 9% stake in Qihoo 360 that was issued to Zhou during the company's privatization process last year, as well as a 1% stake that Zhou already controlled.
Zhou also said that going forward Qihoo 360 will focus on developing its security business in two ways:
1. The company will move beyond personal security to focusing on enterprise, social, and national security. Qihoo 360 will seek to protect even larger networks from hacker threats or attacks from other nations.
2. The company will follow developments in Internet of Things (IoT) technology and will expand from online security to address offline security. Zhou touched on home infrastructure security, wearable devices, and smart home appliances in his discussion of Qihoo 360's plans for the IoT domain.
Zhou said that Qihoo 360 currently has approximately 6,000 employees. In the future, the company plans to adopt a "fleet" strategy in terms of its structure and scale, and will transform from a single large entity into an array of smaller business units. Beginning in 2015, Qihoo 360 started to test out splitting off some of its business units as independent operating entities, giving younger employees and technology leaders opportunities to exercise entrepreneurial leadership.
Zhou said that over the next 3-5 years he envisions that the Qihoo Group will come to oversee up to 100 business entities, and that several of these will become independently listed companies.
Keywords: Zhou Hongyi Internet security Qihoo 360 QIHU IoT corporate restructuring wearable computer smart appliance national security enterprise security
Sending
