Huawei former senior scientist and inventor of the 4G core technology SFR, Yang Xuezhi, posted on May 28 in the Guancha Syndicate Forum, strongly questioning the “Tau (τ) Law” announced by the President of Huawei’s Semiconductor Business Department, He Tingbo, on May 25. Yang Xuezhi clearly stated that he recognizes Huawei’s engineering achievements, but firmly opposes this promotional campaign. He believes that the technical solution corresponding to the Tau Law is a “mature and high-quality engineering innovation” — under the context where process technology is approaching physical limits, it taps into performance potential by restructuring circuit architecture and optimizing signal latency, and has industrial implementation value; but a high-quality engineering improvement is by no means equivalent to a fundamental scientific breakthrough, and it has no right to be named a “law.” Yang Xuezhi pointed out that the Tau Law “lacks rigorous mathematical derivation, has no original theoretical system, and no universal objective law applicable to the entire industry.” He stated that its core concept “geometric scaling” is the basic process logic of the Moore era, and “temporal scaling” is a common engineering method already widespread across the industry for optimizing signal latency. Huawei merely repackaged and renamed existing engineering solutions, forcibly elevating them to a law leading the world, which in his view constitutes “academic fraud.”
Yang Xuezhi characterized this release as a concentrated manifestation of Huawei’s long-standing problem of “saying one thing about fundamental research and doing another,” and cited the narrative that has circulated for years about a “Russian math prodigy helping Huawei unlock 2G/3G/4G” as a precedent — he believes that story has long been disproven and is consistent with the Tau Law promotion. He warned that when the most recognized domestic tech giant repeatedly packages engineering optimizations as scientific breakthroughs, it will continue to blur the boundary between engineering technology and fundamental science, discourage researchers truly engaged in basic research, and corrupt the entire research ecosystem, making “solid scholarship obscure and speculative hype rampant.” It is noteworthy that Yang Xuezhi himself once worked at Huawei, and this criticism comes from an insider, sparking widespread discussion in the tech community; as of publication, Huawei has not yet publicly responded.