Rare! Dissatisfied with compensation, Absen Chairman opposes his own election as chairman China Light Network

Dissatisfied with the compensation for the chairman's position, Ding Yanhui, chairman of Absen (300389.SZ), cast the sole vote against in the company's proposal "Election of Chairman of the Sixth Board of Directors".

Founder Refuses to Serve as Chairman

On November 28, Absen issued the announcement of resolutions from the first meeting of its sixth board of directors. The meeting reviewed and approved multiple proposals, including revising company regulations, electing the chairman and members of various special committees, and appointing the general manager and other senior executives. Voting results showed that the vast majority of proposals received 9 votes in favor with no opposing votes.

However, when voting on the "Proposal on Electing the Chairman of the Sixth Board of Directors", the result was: 8 votes in favor, 1 vote against, 0 abstentions, 0 abstentions due to recusal.

令人吃惊的是，作为公司董事长的丁彦辉对本议案投了反对票，反对理由：对董事长岗位薪酬不满意。

As for why Ding Yanhui is dissatisfied with the compensation, whether the compensation is too high or too low is not specified in the announcement.

Despite Ding Yanhui's clear opposition, in accordance with the Company Law, Securities Law, and relevant provisions of the Articles of Association, the election result remains valid, and Ding Yanhui continues to serve as Chairman of the Sixth Board of Directors. This seemingly contradictory phenomenon has sparked widespread discussion in the capital market.

Ding Yanhui is not an ordinary professional manager, but the founder of Absen. Data shows that Ding Yanhui was born in 1973 and founded Absen in August 2001. He has served as Chairman of the Board and Legal Representative ever since (serving concurrently as General Manager for eighteen years). He currently also serves as a Director of Huizhou Absen, Chairman of Absen Investment Company, Director of Absen Conference Services Company, Director of Shenzhen Hailong Education Service Co., Ltd., Council Member of the Shenzhen Absen Public Welfare Foundation, and Executive Director and General Manager of Shenzhen Ruidao Enterprise Management Co., Ltd., among other positions.

As of the date of disclosure of this announcement, Ding Yanhui directly holds 124,671,149 shares of the company, accounting for 33.78% of the total share capital, and is the actual controller of the company.

According to the 2024 Annual Report of Absen, Ding Yanhui's total pre-tax compensation from the company in 2024 was 4.3556 million yuan, which includes principal and returns from the employee stock ownership plan amounting to 1.7399 million yuan. Compared to his 2023 annual salary of 2.8845 million yuan, Ding Yanhui's salary increased by approximately 51% within one year. In 2022, Ding Yanhui's pre-tax compensation was 2.8478 million yuan.

Is the salary actually high or low? Why is there dissatisfaction with ?

Data shows that Absen went public on August 1, 2014. Its main business is the R&D, production, sales, and service of LED application products. Main product lines include: advertising display equipment, stage display equipment, commercial display equipment, data visualization equipment, conference screen solutions, professional AV solutions, and meeting services.

In 2024, the company achieved total operating revenue of 3.663 billion yuan, a year-on-year (YoY) decrease of 8.58%; net profit attributable to parents was 117 million yuan, a YoY decrease of 62.98%; and non-recurring net profit was 75.8969 million yuan, a YoY decrease of 72.51%.

The report for the first three quarters of this year shows that the company's revenue was 2.872 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 5.66%; among them, the single-quarter revenue for the third quarter was 1.053 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 14.5%; net profit attributable to parent company shareholders for the first three quarters was 185 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 57.33%; the single-quarter net profit attributable to parent company shareholders for the third quarter was 69.0487 million yuan, increasing year-on-year by 138.55%.

Company's main business competitors include Lianyan (300296.SZ), Unilumin (300232.SZ), Opto Electronics (002587.SZ), Ledman Optoelectronics (300162.SZ), etc.

For comparison, based on the closing market cap on December 2nd, Leyard and Unilumin both have higher market caps than Absen. Moreover, Unilumin's and Absen's revenue and net profit attributable to the parent company are also superior to Absen's. During the same period, Unilumin reported revenue of 3.658 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 7.38%, achieving a net profit attributable to the parent company of 121 million yuan, up 20.61% year-on-year.同期，Leyard although revenue slightly declined, but net profit increased by 34.03% year-on-year.

However, the annual salaries of the chairmen of both companies are lower than that of Ding Yanhui. According to their respective 2024 annual reports, Leedarson chairman Li Jun's pre-tax compensation was 1.051 million, Unilumin chairman Lin Mingfeng's pre-tax compensation was 1.0073 million, while Abison chairman Ding Yanhui's pre-tax compensation for the same period was 4.3556 million.

Furthermore, in absolute terms, Ding Yanhui's compensation ranks among the top in A-share listed companies. According to Tonghuashun iFinD data, this compensation level ranks 135th among more than 5,000 A-share companies.

Therefore, many netizens expressed confusion: why is an annual salary of 4.35 million yuan still considered unsatisfactory?

Media contacted Absen for verification; the company responded that "this was a clerical error by the Board Secretary," while in reality, it stems from the Chairman's dissatisfaction with the company's incentive mechanism.

Absen also stated that the chairman wants to carry out some reforms and innovations, such as: the corporate governance structure is not sound and needs optimization; the benefit distribution mechanism is not sound; the compensation incentive mechanism is unreasonable.

Ding Yanhui also frankly admitted that the "dissatisfaction with the chairman's compensation" stated in the proposal is merely a superficial reason; the deeper causes lie in issues with corporate governance structure, profit distribution mechanisms, and compensation allocation systems. He is determined to lead by example and initiate reforms. He hopes that open discussion on the chairman's compensation will trigger a comprehensive review of the company's overall compensation system.

It is also reported that Ding Yanhui, Deng Jiangbo, and Ren Yonghong are the founders of Absen. According to Absen's Q3 report this year, their shareholdings are 33.78%, 16.61%, and 14.23% respectively, making them the top three shareholders of the company. In addition, Ren Yonghong holds an additional 1.70% jointly with his spouse through "Shanghai Tongyi Investment Management Co., Ltd. - Tongyi Mingxi No. 1 Private Securities Investment Fund".

Another detail is that in the lineup of special committees generated by this board meeting, although Ding Yanhui served as Chairman of the Strategy Committee and Member of the Nomination Committee, he did not join the Compensation and Assessment Committee. This position is held by Zhao Jiuli.

丁彦辉的"自我反对"已引发市场对上市公司治理的广泛讨论。有分析认为，这是创始人以"破局者"姿态推动企业治理甚至现代化转型的标志性事件。