Midea Group — Midea: historical allegations, later retrial and employee convictions

analysisIn September 2012, former Kelon chairman Gu Chujun alleged that officials had acted under improper influence and that Midea sought Kelon through bribery. The retained report presents this as Gu’s accusation, not a court finding. The allegation concerned the old Midea Electric company. His own criminal case and the allegation about Midea are separate matters. Midea Electric said the statements had no factual basis, damaged its reputation and reserved legal remedies. The named official denied Gu’s account; the securities regulator said supervision must rest on facts and law. In April 2019, a Supreme People’s Court retrial revoked Gu’s false-capital and disclosure convictions while retaining a misappropriation conviction with a five-year sentence. That later ruling replaces the outdated description of his ten-year conviction, but does not establish Gu’s separate allegation against Midea. ^{1 2}

analysisA June 2022 report of court records describes a Midea engineer, anonymized as Tang, convicted of accepting RMB1.9 million in contractor payments. He received a three-year sentence suspended for four years and a RMB100,000 fine. The report separately describes a former research executive, anonymized as Mao, sentenced to one year for RMB70,000 in supplier payments, with the conviction upheld on appeal. These are reported convictions of employees. Midea is not described as the bribery defendant in these cases; separate real-estate employee incidents do not merge the listed companies. Tang did not dispute the charge in court. His family paid RMB1 million compensation to Midea, obtaining its forgiveness, and returned the RMB1.9 million proceeds for confiscation. A company contact told the reporter they did not know of the case. The sentences, restitution and company forgiveness accompany the allegations; the record is not presented merely as unresolved arrests. ³