SHENZHEN: Telecom giant Huawei plans to develop its own applications if the United States of America doesn’t allow google to provide its services to Huawei.
“If the US government doesn’t allow Google to provide services to Huawei, we are working on alternative options. We will develop our own applications to resolve the issue. The US sanctions have more positive implications for Huawei than negative ones. We have this capability and we will do it if necessary,” said Guo Fulin, President International Media Affairs of Huawei in an exclusive interview with a select group of journalists here at the company headquarters.
Huawei headquarters is a world’s wonder with modern and state of the art IT equipment and facilities. Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. is the world’s largest telecom equipment maker and China’s largest telephone-network equipment maker. With 3,442 patents, Huawei became the world’s No. 1 applicant for international patents in 2014.
Flanked by Mr Ammar Tobba, the Regional Head of Huawei’s Media Affairs of Middle East Region, and Mr Teddy Lee from Huawei Pakistan, Guo Fulin said that Huawei was ahead in 5G but it needed US partners and allies as the US companies were ahead in Artificial Intelligence (AI), and other related fields.
“5G is just a tool. It is more of an intent. 5G should not be politicized. Even the US allies have not followed rules, hence blaming Huawei is unfair. We are happy that Germany, a US ally, has taken a bold stance and they have decided to implement unified standards,” he noted.
“I believe the management of Google needs to take up the sanctions issue with the US government. We want to work with Google and other partners as we don’t want to wipe out the competition. We believe competitive environment helps technology grow faster. But if Google fails to get sanctions lifted, we will develop our own systems (to bypass sanctions),” said Guo Fulin.
Briefing about company’s contributions to Pakistan, Fulin said Huawei had made huge investments in Pakistan and will continue to expand its network.
“Around 90 percent of the Huawei employees in Pakistan are locals. We have made it a policy to give jobs to the nationals of the country where we invest,” he said.
Responding to a question, Fulin said the customers have to decide on merit which company was serving them well. “Our job is to provide best services,” Fulin said.
He said Pakistan has great potential of 5G but the government needed to prepare itself for the 5G fusion. He said Huawei has built over 270 projects in Pakistan and face recognition systems would also be installed in Safe City Projects working in Pakistan.
Rejecting the US sanctions on Huawei, Guo Fulin said that Huawei was declared guilty without proving any offence against it.
“I believe the US government should lift sanctions and respect laws. US sanctions are like acting as judge, jury and executioner. US sanctions would have implications – but there are more positives for Huawei than the negatives,” he added.
He said the United States is unnecessarily scared of Huawei. “My company encourages healthy competition so as the best can win. We are providing facilities to the end-users. That is why we are popular. People across the world are appreciating our services and are becoming our customers,” he said.
Fulin said the US sanctions against Huawei were uncalled for. “What have we done? We have only demonstrated that we are here. We are not against anyone,” he said and added that Huawei was working to explore the digital transformation and technological innovation of the transportation industry.
“With the rapid integration of Information Communications Technology (ICT) and the smart transportation industry, we are embracing the digital road era. Innovative products and solutions for electronic toll collection holographic road perception, and Internet of Vehicles, will result in safer, more efficient, and smarter transportation systems for urban roads. It would also continuously improve transport capacity, and stimulating service innovation,” Fulin said.
He said that in recent years, the digitization and Artificial Intelligence (AI) had become comprehensive worldwide trends.
“Following this trend, highways throughout China will be upgraded from traditional manual toll collection to automatic collection during 2019. Huawei is committed to introducing the concept of smart power supply to the transportation industry in order to deal with heavy traditional power supply devices and low reliability,” he added. Fulin said Huawei was dedicated to providing customers with innovative transportation solutions such as digital railway and digital urban rail.
“To this end, Huawei has served over 230,000 km of railways and highways, and more than 170 urban rail lines in over 70 cities across the globe,” he said.
Fulin said people are living in the age of Fifth Generation (5G) technology development which has already transformed the world.
“5G has already brought innovation and life for consumers and industries. Those countries who adopted 5G early know the importance of favorable policy and cross-sector collaboration more for speeding up the next stage of 5G development.
“To make the most of the 5G, we need to work together to deal with the real challenges that lie ahead including spectrum, site resources, and cross-sector collaboration. 5G is not just faster 4G. It will play a completely different role in our lives, so as in industry, we all need to have a fresh mindset to drive its future development,” said the Huawei media chief.
“In less than one year after standards were frozen, 5G networks had already seen large-scale commercial deployment, much faster than 4G. Different industries were also deriving new value from the first round of industrial 5G applications. 5G applications for enhanced mobile broadband, entertainment, and manufacturing are already here,” said Fulin.
“We can’t say for sure what type of applications we’ll see in the future, but right now it’s clear that every single industry will benefit from 5G technology,” he noted. Fulin said that spectrum resources, specifically the cost and availability of spectrum, were one of the most significant barriers that carriers face moving forward.
