Tan, 62, was removed from his post at state-owned giant AVIC in March 2023 for age reasons, according to the party’s personnel management arm.
Tan, a native of Hunan province, is a technocrat trained in aviation engine design, manufacturing and engineering. He had spent two decades with AVIC, a conglomerate with over 100 subsidiaries and 450,000 employees worldwide – more than America’s Boeing and Europe’s Airbus combined.
AVIC was the sixth largest defence contractor globally as of 2022 and second largest Chinese defence contractor by annual revenue after China North Industries Group, according to data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
In 2022, Tan vowed to turn AVIC into a world-class military equipment supplier.
Through its many subsidiaries, it manufactures some of China’s leading fighter aircraft such as the J-10, J-11, and J-20.
The company is also a major supplier of components for China’s small regional jet ARJ-21 and the C919, a narrowbody medium-haul aircraft. Its exports include the regional turboprop MA60 series and Y12s, and the AC series helicopters.
The shake-up exposed rampant irregularities in bidding and procurement processes for military equipment.
Li, 66, previously oversaw military procurement. He was accused of accepting “large sums of money” to seek benefits for others, and allegedly bribing others.
Wei was accused of accepting a huge amount of money and helping others to gain improper benefits.
AVIC and other eight state-owned enterprises operating in key sectors including nuclear, aerospace and shipbuilding promised in July to tighten their bidding and procurement rules as well as look at areas such as hiring and quality control, following a series of inspections by the CCDI.
Former CASC chairman Wu Yansheng was among three senior aerospace-defence executives stripped of their seats on the country’s top political advisory body, the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), in December.
