Huawei’s temporary license to trade with U.S. companies expired just a few days ago after expansion after expansion, but the Chinese manufacturer is in for even more trouble. The U.S. Department of Commerce and Department of State have announced that they will further restrict access to U.S. technology and add 38 additional Huawei branches to the entity list.
The temporary license will be replaced by a permanent authorization for Huawei entities with the sole purpose of providing ongoing security research critical to maintaining the integrity and reliability of existing and currently ‘fully operational networks’ and equipment. ” The new exemption is therefore exclusively intended for network infrastructure with built-in Huawei technology. That means it will be even harder for Huawei to deliver further Android system updates.
Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross explains why the government decided to take this step, concentrating primarily on Huawei to gain access to semiconductor products and intelligence from American manufacturers:
Huawei and its foreign affiliates have extended their efforts to obtain advanced semiconductors, developed or produced from American software and technology to achieve the policy objectives of the Chinese Communist Party. Because we restricted access to U.S. technology, Huawei and its affiliates have worked through third parties to exploit U.S. technology in a manner that undermines U.S. national security and foreign policy interests. This multilingual action demonstrates our continued commitment to hindering Huawei’s capabilities.
While we have good authority to say that Play Services updates will not be affected by the new ramifications, we do not know if future Google-ified Android versions or security patches will be delivered to those Huawei phones that still have Google apps and services . In any case, the stricter restrictions will make it virtually impossible for Huawei to continue producing its own processors, let alone imported American chips – much to Qualcomm’s despair.
