Huawei is the world’s top telecommunications network provider. Knowing many Huawei employees, the company’s ascension is well-deserved based on their hard work. 5G added technological edge to cost leadership. As a result, Huawei filed for more patents in Europe than any company, including Bosch, Siemens, and Philips.
Huawei handsets are now the third highest selling in Germany. This brings us to an interesting crossroads — do Western countries want to develop as fast as possible by adopting what is best, no matter the source, even at the risk of not mastering the technology involved? Or do they want to fend off foreign technology and rely on domestic developments, even if it costs more and/or takes longer, (affecting developments like self-driving cars), and maintain domestic capability?
The US will not depend on Huawei but rather on European suppliers. They would call upon their allies to do the same. Australia, New Zealand and Japan have followed. Europe is in a tricky place and under intense US pressure to ban Huawei outright.
Right now, Telekom and O2 use Huawei. Eliminating those components would cost billions and slow network deployment by two years, according to a recent company memo. Vodafone Germany belongs to Vodafone UK, which also operates in France, Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Greece.
Yet most governments will give themselves further options to go either way. The German government decided to amend its telecommunications law, requiring guarantees by suppliers that no information is shared with other governments (“no-spy agreement”). More importantly, suppliers must share source codes, which allows certification after a search for vulnerabilities and backdoors.However, this recent “no-spy agreement” could be interpreted as a form of Huawei exclusion, since China’s 2017 National Intelligence Law requires its companies to cooperate with national intelligence efforts wherever they operate.