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Huawei CEO Ken Hu took to the stage at MWC today to announce new developments in its 5G partnerships and offer a further rebuttal in defense of the company’s trustworthiness. On the latter point, the company has come under fire from U.S. officials over the past several months with claims that its equipment poses a security risk due to its ties with Beijing. A bill is even currently under consideration that would effectively ban the company’s equipment from being used on government-associated networks. Hu took the opportunity to dismiss the accusation as something that simply isn’t based in reality. That’s a statement that’s been backed up by several secondary sources in the past, most recently with statements made by several telecoms. While the executive did concede that security problems may exist on the supply chain side that network operators and suppliers depend on, he went on to say that Huawei is committed to an open discussion with the countries it hopes to operate in. Fortunately for Huawei, it doesn’t appear as though the fears bear out to a substantial degree outside of the U.S.
In fact, the mobile equipment manufacturer and smartphone giant announced the beginning of 5G trials in the pre-commercial development phases in partnership with more than 30 network operators. Those are reportedly based in a wide range of countries, including the U.K., South Korea, Japan, Italy, and Canada. That’s on top of ongoing network buildouts in other regions of the world such as Austrailia. Meanwhile, 5G field trial agreements have been reached between Huawei and 45 operators. Huawei believes that the first commercialization of 5G networks will begin this year and it tentatively expects to experience growth in each of its business divisions, according to Hu.
Huawei is presently the world’s leading mobile network equipment supplier and has a number of companies and entities come to its defense in recent weeks. However, Hu maintains that the tech giant will stay positive and open on the issue until it can be laid to rest. In the meantime, if those expectations hold, Huawei is well-placed to further solidify its position as the world’s largest provider of mobile networking equipment for the foreseeable future, its rotating CEO believes.