When will the fighting cease?
It has been quite the last few months for Huawei. Honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a company so popular in the world so embroiled in controversy.
Let’s catch you up with a quick timeline of events:
Timeline of events:
02/18: FBI Director warned US consumers against buying Huawei or ZTE smartphones.
03/18: Best Buy announced they would stop selling Huawei smartphones soon.
05/18: The Pentagon banned the sale of Huawei or ZTE phones on military bases.
08/18: Huawei became the second-biggest smartphone seller in the world, knocking off Apple.
09/18: Huawei got caught cheating on benchmark tests (making their phones appear to be faster than they are).
12/18: Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou was arrested in Canada, per the request of the US.
12/18: Huawei passed 200 million smartphone shipments.
05/19: Trump signs an executive order, essentially banning Huawei from the US.
The executive order Trump signed didn’t just set the stage for Huawei to be banned from the US, but it also set the stage for many businesses to stop working with Huawei (by force of law). Google is cutting off Huawei from the Google Play Store, essentially forcing Huawei to make its own operating system.
Huawei was once the second-biggest smartphone company in the world (at least in smartphone sales), but now it is a shell of itself. They are attempting to make their own operating system, but most companies that have tried that have failed.
Is Huawei seriously this bad of a security threat? The US has several compelling reasons to believe so, whether you buy all their reasons or not, at the same time, we should also admit that the China trade war has much to do with this. As tensions rise between China and the US, it only makes sense that successful companies will get stuck in the middle (like Huawei). I for one hope Huawei can successfully turn itself around and remove all conflicts of interest. I hope they can become a more secure company and build bridges to come back into the US. They make great smartphones at great prices, and hopefully, we can access them and enjoy them securely, without a possibility of the Chinese government spying on us!
Any thoughts on Huawei and the events that have transpired so far? Leave a comment below!