Huawei executive said changes could include organization structure and processes
Chinese vendor Huawei would do anything necessary to convince governments that the company can be a trusted partner to build 5G networks after the U.S. government suggested its allies ban the company from the provision of 5G gear over security concerns, according to a report by the Financial Times.
In an interview with the U.K. outlet, Vincent Peng, Huawei’s president for Western Europe, said the company is prepared to take actions to convince governments that the firm can be a reliable provider.
“Anything needed to do this transformation we are committed to do this. Restructure the organization, rebuild the processes, rebuild the products,” he said. “Process, personal skills, engineering capability, anything,” Peng added.
“We thought in the past the challenge was the backdoor issues, the security issues, so we try everything, try all the best efforts, to try to prove we are a good company,” he said.
“But now the challenge is even bigger. It is for the whole industry, for the whole value chain, the whole system. As a leading supplier, we have to take our own responsibility going forward,” the executive added.
Huawei recently agreed to spend $2 billion to overhaul its systems in the U.K. after British officials expressed their concerns over using Huawei for 5G deployments.
In August, Australian authorities announced a decision to prevent certain vendors from taking part in the rollout of 5G mobile networks across the country, effectively banning Chinese companies Huawei and ZTE from involvement. Huawei said the decision by the Australian government to block the company from the country’s domestic 5G market is politically motivated and not the result of a fact-based decision-making process.
Meanwhile, some U.S. lawmakers urged the Canadian government to ban Huawei from providing 5G gear to Canadian carriers over security allegations. However, Prime Minister Trudeau said that he does not want politics to interfere in the decision to select vendors for the deployment of 5G networks in Canada. Trudeau also said that he trusts the ability of Canada’s spy agencies to mitigate any potential security risks.
Huawei has also recently said it was seeking to establish contacts with New Zealand authorities following a recent announcement that the vendor has been blocked from participating in local carrier Spark’s 5G network deployment. New Zealand’s Intelligence services Minister Andrew said that the government’s decision not to allow Spark to use Huawei gear over national security risk was not a ban, according to a report by the New Zealand Herald.
Earlier this week, Japan’s government issued instructions effectively banning China’s Huawei and ZTE from official contracts over security concerns.
The Japanese ban will cover purchases of personal computers, servers and telecommunications equipment by the government. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said the new rules were not targeting any particular company.
