US ban having little impact on Huawei

Source: Xinhua | 2019-03-27

The US campaign against Huawei is having little impact on the company’s sales and it is unlikely many countries will follow the United States in banning Huawei from building next-generation mobile networks, its rotating Chairman Eric Xu said.

“Recently we are seeing a large number of countries making their own decisions,” Xu said during an interview at Huawei Technologies’ headquarters in Shenzhen, in southern China.

European countries such as Germany and France have indicated they are likely to ignore the US call to shut out the telecoms giant.

Xu said that Huawei’s revenue jumped 36 percent over the first two months of 2019 and was set for a 15 percent annual rise to US$125 billion, underlining strength in its smartphone business and sales of computing and communications networks.

Huawei has been facing mounting scrutiny, led by the United States, amid claims its equipment could be for spying. The company, however, says the concerns are unfounded.

Xu said he does not expect the United States to intensify its attack by barring sales of US components to Huawei.

Huawei is the world’s third-largest buyer of computer chips, many of which come from US companies, and a sales ban would be disruptive to the global tech industry, Xu said.

Huawei’s growth is mainly being driven by its booming smartphone business and sales of computing and communications networks to government and business customers.