Can the "anti-corruption storm" of big companies cut off "hidden rules"? | Legal observation, executives use bribe money to buy houses in Beijing, Liu Haibo | Company | Big Companies

On the afternoon of August 8th, a sudden news shook the market, and Liu Haibo, Senior Vice President of Wanda Group, was taken away by the public security organs. Subsequently, multiple media outlets followed up and reported that this matter may be related to Wanda's internal anti-corruption efforts.

This incident has once again brought the anti-corruption efforts of private enterprises into the public eye. The reporter found on the China Judgement Document Network that in the past two or three years, Huawei, Tencent, ByteDance, Kwai, Didi, JD and many other major Internet companies have had their relevant managers sentenced for bribery of non state staff.

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In their eyes, the power in hand is the best way to exchange money.

Yu Xiaosheng, former Senior Technical Director of Didi Corporation, is responsible for the construction and operation of network servers, and can also participate in server procurement bidding. After receiving cash of 7.97 million yuan from one supplier and a Mercedes Benz sedan worth over 700000 yuan from another supplier, Yu Xiaosheng began his own operation. He not only privately disclosed the technical scores that should be kept confidential during the bidding process to the two companies, so that they can adjust their bids, but also directly modified the scores of other bidding companies to ensure that both companies can win the bid.

With the bribe he received, Yu Xiaosheng spent 7.5 million yuan to buy a house in Xicheng District, Beijing, and also sent himself to prison. He was sentenced to 5 years in prison.

Zheng, who used to be the sales manager of Huawei's Shanghai office for terminal chips, used his power to sell chips to someone and accepted bribes. For example, after accepting a bribe of 3.23 million yuan, Zheng handed over the opportunity to sell Huawei chips as an agent to a company in Shenzhen. In addition, he also artificially increased the actual demand for chips from customers, intercepting excess chips and partnering to resell them to others, earning a share of 1.36 million yuan.

Zheng was also unable to escape legal sanctions, as he surrendered himself and was ultimately sentenced to three years in prison.

Besides those in charge of bidding, sales, and cafeteria, they can also accept bribes and receive more.

Gao Chuanfeng, a catering expert with ByteDance, has been fully responsible for the introduction, docking, daily supervision, capital settlement, contract renewal and other links of the company's catering suppliers since February 2017. He started accepting bribes only two months after joining the company. Over a period of three years, Gao Chuanfeng solicited a total of 1.047 million yuan in bribes from two catering suppliers, seeking benefits for the two companies in terms of fund settlement, contract renewal, and other aspects.

After the second trial by the Beijing First Intermediate People's Court, Gao Chuanfeng was sentenced to 6 years in prison, one year less than the sentence in the first trial.

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Companies naturally detest fraudulent activities such as accepting bribes from internal personnel. In recent years, major corporations have frequently staged "anti-corruption storms".

Wanda Group, which has attracted attention this week, has always been known for having a strict anti-corruption system internally. In addition to internal self inspection, Wanda's audit system also encourages partners to report. The information on the company's official website and official account clearly indicates the reporting channels: in the process of participating in the business cooperation of Wanda Group, if Wanda's personnel ask for cards, ask for kickbacks, manipulate bidding and other violations of discipline, they can contact the Audit Center.

Tencent will also publicly release the annual anti fraud work situation. Throughout 2022, Tencent's Anti Fraud Investigation Department discovered and investigated more than 70 cases of violating Tencent High Voltage Line. More than 100 people were dismissed for violating Tencent High Voltage Line, and more than ten were transferred to public security organs for handling on suspicion of committing crimes. One of the more well-known ones is Zhang Meng, the former producer of Tencent Video. According to the announcement, he was sentenced to three years in prison for the crime of accepting bribes as a non-state employee.

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The fundamental reason for corporate anti-corruption is still the serious losses caused by internal personnel fraud.

At a forum attended by reporters a few years ago, a law firm organized and analyzed relevant data for 2019 based on public information on the Judgment Document Network.

At that time, there were a total of 3995 cases of corporate employee fraud in China that had undergone judicial judgments, with a total amount of over 7.3 billion yuan and an average case value of approximately 1.82 million yuan. Among the cases that can determine the nature of the enterprise, 2815 cases of fraud occurred in private enterprises, accounting for 89.25%.

It is not difficult to see from the above data that private enterprises have been greatly harmed by "insiders". Compared to state-owned enterprises supervised by the Discipline Inspection and Supervision Commission, private enterprises often lack internal anti-corruption system construction. Especially for some rapidly developing private enterprises, the system often gives way to the speed of development. This has led some companies to find that when they want to fight against corruption, they are already infested with pests.

Not long ago, an insider and reporter mentioned that a new Internet enterprise frequently committed job-related crimes. After a thorough investigation, he described the anti-corruption system of this company as "leaking like a sieve."

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In today's world where anti-corruption efforts in large corporations are increasing, internal fraud incidents still occur frequently. In addition to the imperfect system and the inability to completely curb human greed, the existence of "hidden rules" also gives many people an excuse to collect money.

A few days ago, reporters attended a trial on the crime of bribery for non-state workers. The defendant is a department manager of a well-known company, and although they cannot make a final decision, they can recommend agents to their superiors.

That's enough.

So, the list of recommended agents that he handed over to his superiors were all agents who had been given a "benefit fee". Sometimes, he would say a few good words in front of his superiors, suppress project quotations, and help agents strive for more profits.

In the trial, the defendant admitted to accepting bribes, but believed that their actions did not actually cause losses to the company and should be punished lightly. His defense lawyer also stated that the agents recommended by the defendant all met the company's standards, and later it was proven that the projects undertaken did not have any quality issues. "A company and B company can actually do it, he just recommended A company."

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It should be said that there are many people who share the same ideas as him.

Many people dare not openly recommend or choose unqualified agents or suppliers because the risk is too high. In case of quality problems, they will be immediately investigated. But recommending or choosing the one who has been given a "benefit fee" from qualified candidates doesn't seem like a big risk, after all, it won't cause any loss to the company, and there is a high probability that you won't be found to have paid.

For a long time, this seemed to have become a "hidden rule" in many industries. But did it really not cause any losses?

The senior executives of the defendant's company also attended the court hearing. After the court hearing, he refuted the defendant's statement: "If the agent thinks that only by sending money can they undertake the project, is this not damaging the company's image and commercial reputation?"

This principle was told by Liu Bei over a thousand years ago to Ah Dou, "Do not do evil for its sake.".