Background
Zhang was born in 1960 in a cadre family in Changsha, Hunan Province. He was very fond of painting, and demonstrated artistic talents when growing up.
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Yue Zhang
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Education
Majoring in arts, Zhang studied in Chenzhou Normal Junior College in Hunan Province during 1978–80. After graduation, he worked for several years as an art teacher in a middle school.
Career
In October 1984, he made a bold move by resigning and starting his entrepreneurial endeavor. He began with trading, which was very common among Chinese entrepreneurs at that time. Then he stepped into advertising, interior decoration, and construction. In 1988 Zhang Yue, along with his younger brother Zhang Jian, who had just graduated from the Harbin University of Technology, developed a straight-burning absorptive air-conditioning system. Based on this technology, the two brothers formally established the Broad Air Conditioning Ltd Company in 1992. By 1996, Broad’s technology began to take a lead in sales. In 2003, Broad started to produce natural gas air-conditioning machines for domestic use, and moved the company headquarters from Hunan Province to Beijing, while keeping a production base of 320 000 square meters in Changsha.
Under Zhang’s leadership, Broad has become the world’s largest manufacturer of technically advanced absorptive air-conditioning equipment. All Broad’s technologies are developed independently, with intellectual property rights and more than 70 patents. The company has branch offices in over 20 main cities in China, and in New York and Paris. Its products have passed security and technology authentication in many jurisdictions: CCMS in China, ASME, ETL, and UL in the USA, and CE in Europe, and have sold to over 30 countries. They have substantial market shares of the air-conditioner industry in China, the USA, Germany, Spain, and France. Focused on high quality and low prices, Broad has contributed to the improvement of the image of Chinese products in developed markets. The company has established its own international brand, and is making efforts to improve the country’s energy structure and consumption in light of the potential threat of a worldwide energy crisis.
Achievements
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In terms of his business strategies, Zhang remains proud of the fact that Broad has no loans, and has resisted the urge to enter the stock market or participate in any joint capital project. In 1999 he was the only representative from Chinese private enterprises to participate in the Fortune Global Forum. In 2002 Zhang was named among the top ten private entrepreneurs in China. Because of his enthusiasm for continuous innovation within the company, the Broad Group has been ranked as one of the most respected companies in China for four consecutive years. A tenacious and brave person, Zhang believes the ‘farm principle,’ that is, no pain no gain, and more pay more harvest. A flying enthusiast, in 1997 Zhang received the first Chinese helicopter license issued to an individual, and became the owner of the first Chinese enterprise airplane.
