Huawei vs the US

“The US is not the international police.” 

- Huawei CEO Ren Zhengfei

My old iPhone SE was getting a bit dated and the performance was slowing. I looked around for a replacement, including out of the Apple range which I had been using since the iPhone 3, a good 10 years or more.

For the first time, I was seriously considering a move away from Apple, even though all my devices were from that company - a MacBook Air, an iMac and a tablet, besides the phone. What caused this was a new product from Huawei Technologies - the P30 Pro.

Not only does it beat Apple’s latest brands such as the XS Max in many categories, but it also comes with probably the best camera in the mobile world, in partnership with Germany’s Leica, which provides the lenses for this system. And at about half the price of Apple’s high-end phone.

For many, such an advanced camera system does away with the need to carry an additional camera when going on trips because it outperforms many ordinary cameras, especially the non-professional compact cameras. In effect, you are carrying a camera which can give you effectively 10 times hybrid zoom with no loss of resolution and 50 times digital zoom.

It was for that reason that I was ready to give up Apple for the Huawei P30 Pro... until the US unilaterally declared war on Huawei, accusing it of stealing US technology and banning US firms from supplying Huawei.

The implications are enormous for Huawei - both Google and Microsoft are reviewing their working arrangements with Huawei, while a host of US companies may pull out from supplying chips to Huawei, which produces about half of its requirements internally, while relying on others for the other half.

While there is probably some element of truth that Huawei may have and is engaged in technology theft and espionage, you can’t believe that US companies are not similarly engaged in nefarious practices.

In all probability, Google, Microsoft and even Apple pass on information to US authorities as a matter of routine in the name of global security, and many other firms probably do that for their host countries. It may even be justifiable as a means of pre-empting terrorist activities, for instance.

So, why then this series of sanctions on Huawei and the continued detention of the Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou (below), also the daughter of Huawei founder and CEO Ren Zhengfei, in Vancouver pending extradition proceedings to the US for sanction busting when everyone is engaged in the same game of technology theft and espionage?

The answer is that Huawei has been steadily, relentlessly and quietly advancing its technological prowess. So much so that experts consider it to be the most advanced in terms of 5G, the next generation mobile technology which will see a quantum leap in speed and capacity. Huawei is said to be at least a year ahead of its US rivals.

In brutal, US-first style, President Donald Trump has taken unprecedented measures to curb Huawei, which may well see an escalation of its disputes with China and China companies and which may come back to bite the US itself. They could lose the China market, whose size in terms of the value of goods and services produced might exceed that of the US in 10 years, to make it the economic power.

Considering China’s still high economic growth rate and that the population is about five times that of the US, that is not an impossible scenario, although it does not mean their living standards will be equalised. Still, it is an indication of which country dominates the world.

Trump clearly wants the US to dominate and he is using means, fair and foul, to ensure that. It will not only be in the realm of trade, but in the world of technology as well. Also, in time to come, it will also be war, not necessarily literally, for the limited resources of the world.

Right now I am rooting for Huawei, which is producing a phone which is better than the best Apple has to offer and at a tad over half the price - that’s great for me and millions of customers across the world.

But will I buy my P30 Pro from Huawei? Would you when there is so much uncertainty over its operating system, how it will interface with Google, Microsoft and other US products, both hardware and software? Probably not.

Trump has raised the ante in the battle for world dominance. The danger is unilateral decisions by the US which are not checked or balanced by any international body specifically set up for that purpose. Today it's Huawei, tomorrow it can be anyone else in the proxy war for world dominance.

For the rest of us who are not China or the US, it helps to form our blocs. Well, the EU is already there, the UK will probably follow the US, China is cultivating its own satellite states through money and debt, India is a power, but far behind China. For us, Asean can be a useful bloc, but only if they can get their act together - 600 million people with a production of roughly a fifth of China’s US$14.3 trillion is significant.

We need to tread carefully in the minefield laid by the superpowers and maintain our equilibrium at all times. If we can’t be neutral, let’s act in our best interests, always.

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P GUNASEGARAM says the US is a bad choice for international police. Email: t.p.guna@gmail.com - Mkini