Statements by US President Donald Trump that Huawei could be part of a trade agreement between the United States and China were welcomed by the Chinese manufacturer. The Chinese equipment manufacturer is strongly hoping that a solution can be found before 19 August, when the full implementation of the US measures will begin.
In the midst of the Sino-American trade war, the Trump administration placed Huawei on a list of suspicious companies that are prohibited from selling technological equipment for fear of Beijing using it for espionage purposes. However, the Chinese equipment manufacturer has a temporary exemption that allows it to keep its existing networks and provide software updates for its phones until 19 August.
The Chinese manufacturer therefore hopes that a solution will be found within this timeframe. According to the Chinese group's spokesman in Brussels, two scenarios are emerging: either an agreement is reached in the trade negotiations or the consequences will be much deeper.
“Life will be more complicated for Huawei, but also for everyone in the world”, said Jakub Hera-Adamowicz on Friday 24 May. And he continued, “The costs of destroying the entire supply chain will be so high that hopefully we can unlock the situation”.
Despite this apparent optimism, the US blacklist has caused chain reaction, the most important being Google's decision to no longer do business with Huawei, cutting off its access to its Android operating system. The company has been working for several months to develop its own operating system, but it is not expected to be available in Europe until the second quarter of 2020.
In Europe, EE and Vodafone operators have excluded 5G-compatible Huawei smartphones from their pre-orders prior to the launch of their respective networks in the United Kingdom in the coming weeks.
After having already invested in Sweden, Germany and Italy, Huawei announced at the VivTech conference in Paris from 16-18 May that it would invest €35 million in its Paris OpenLab, without this package being directly linked to the US ban. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)