Earlier this month, the Trump administration added Huawei to a trade blacklist over national security concerns, effectively forbidding U.S. companies from doing business with the Chinese smartphone and telecom giant.
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As the U.S.-China trade war continues to escalate, it has been suggested that China could retaliate to the Huawei ban by enforcing a similar ban on a large American company like Apple. However, even Huawei's own founder Ren Zhengfei admitted that he would oppose such a move, offering praise for the iPhone maker.
Speaking through a translator, Ren told Bloomberg that Apple is both the "world's leading company" and his "teacher":
That will not happen, first of all. And second of all, if that happens, I'll be the first to protest. Apple is the world's leading company. If there was no Apple, there would be no mobile internet. If there was no Apple to help show us the world, we would not see the beauty of this world. Apple is my teacher — it's advancing in front of us. As a student, why should I oppose my teacher? I would never do that.
Last week, investment firm Goldman Sachs warned that Apple's per-share earnings could take a 29 percent hit if China stops importing its products.
Ren appeared confident that Huawei can prevail despite the U.S. trade ban, suggesting that the company will ramp up its in-house technologies if necessary. Huawei already designs its own Kirin processors for some smartphones, but that relies on ARM, which severed ties with Huawei after the U.S. trade ban.
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Top Rated Comments
So much for all the people "hoping" China would retaliate. This guy is smart - he knows how much Apple means to the Chinese economy and how much revenue/employment they generate. Cutting off your nose to spite your face is never good business practice.
I also think that by praising Apple he's hinting that they don't want to see this trade war escalate and would like to come to a settlement. So he's avoiding being critical of Apple.
China has been banning American tech companies in the name of 'national security' for the past forever. US did not retaliate on the ban of Google or Facebook or Amazon. The US didn't retaliate because 2 reasons: 1. US - China import/export/manufacturing relations were too important to jeopardize. 2. The US government upholds the notion a country has the right to protect themselves in the name of national security (I'm not going to go over issues in the Middle East etc etc that's a very different animal compared to US-China relations).
US should have banned Huawei when China banned American tech companies but didn't due to above reasons. China has been taking advantage over different countries and companies for a very long time few examples are: the tech that companies bring into China to use for mass production tools (and other means to produce tech goods) turns into Chinese asset when they are done with it (its their law). You ever hear why Trump keep saying that China must stop stealing tech? This is one of MANY tactics they use to acquire other country's R&D for free. It goes beyond stealing trade secrets from within like Qualcomm, Microsoft, Dell, and other American tech companies and also not paying for royalties or going through proper licensing procedures to using other companies' tech among others. Not only this, the Chinese government provides rewards and even cash payouts for people/organizations to bring secrets or company plans/blueprints/R&D to the Chinese government. They are rewarded and therefore this type of practice is encouraged.
China has been and still riding on the fact that they mass produce for the world and using this not as negotiation piece but rather a weapon to coerce companies and countries to follow their way or else the supply line would be destroyed. What can companies do but to listen when their profits are going to be effected. Not to mention there are heavy sacrifices companies must make in order to have their goods produced in China and not only stealing assets but unfair trade agreement that favours China heavily. This is what initially got Trump to start the trade war due to the unfairness that China has been practicing for a very long time.
Samsung knew this would happen and moved most of their manufacturing to Vietnam where no such ridiculous laws exist and have been doing it for the last 5 years. It took them 10 years in total to set up in Vietnam so they have the production power as similar to China. Foxconn is also about to leave among many other companies because of this coercion and relentless stealing and unfair bargaining chips for China when international supply chains are concerned.
This goes deeper than just Huawei and America. The US has had enough and are now just pushing back when an alternative approach should have been a backup plan since the 70s but nothing happened as China was not seen as a threat like how they saw the Soviet Union way back in history. This pushback should have happened several decades ago and now it is happening and what the US is doing is they are slowly finding equilibrium in power balance between them and China. China wants to be the number 1 super power and that is their objective and will try as long as they have the coercion powers (manufacturing advantage) and will die trying. If this happens the US will no longer be the super power and the dollar will be deemed worthless and must bow to China's demands and coercion. Seeing this happening in the next 50 years if nothing is done about it is a high probability.
The hypocrisy is this, when China banned all the American tech companies it was because of their national security and was accepted by the US. But when US does it to 1 of their companies all hell breaks loose and suddenly America is a tyrant, a bully, an unfair trading partner and China is a victim. US is banning Huawei (for the most part) because of national security same reason as China when they banned Google. This is 1 to 1 fairness and SHOULD be this way. American is just looking after its security and China must accept and back away without taking a shot at Apple (???? how does this make sense).
Samsung has far superior 5G technology than Huawei and the reason Huawei is known for being the global distributor for 5G is because they are significantly cheaper (due to lower tech, government subsidies, and to be competitive) and they force other countries to use (in some cases) by threatening their import/export operations just like how Huawei "demanded" South Korea to use their 5G network and if they don't they will stop importing from them. Yes this actually happened please look it up. This type of thing is sadly extremely common in the Chinese government as a strategy. Irony is that South Korea is practically number 1 in terms of networking tech, internet speeds, and 5G in the world but the Chinese government is still trying to coerce them by threatening Korea's export business.
Samsung right now is in talks with American companies and the government to bring about them the 5G infrastructure. This is million miles better since Samsung is not owned and subsidized by the Korean government there is far lower risk of espionage. For those who don't know, Huawei is essentially owned and dictated by the Chinese government so all the data they obtain can and will be used by their government. Imagine that? All of US military security networking equipment can be spied on and remotely controlled by the Chinese at desperate times? America will not come out on top.
Want to be patriotic this is the right time to do so if you don't want America to become a foot stool for China starting early as 2050. The Chinese media and government can victimize themselves and try to draw sympathy all they want but their plans are incredibly transparent that in the long term they want to overthrow the US and become the sole and leading super power. A country that steals, use coercion as a tactic, invade weaker nations (still doing this look it up), bring no aid or relief programs for other countries...this is a terrifying country to hold the number one global position don't you think?
China needs to be dismantled in terms of their bargaining and coercion power just a little bit. This NEEDS to happen right now. This is a good thing.
Without American or Korean companies to steal from, Huawei is nothing...