Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei said in an internal memo to staff that the company should put its focus on software, an area where the US government has less reach, Reuters reported. Ren said that the company should put its attention on software because future development in the field is fundamentally "outside of US control and we will have greater independence and autonomy". Huawei's 2020 annual report did not specify down how much of its CNY 891.4 billion revenue came from software.
Former US President Donald Trump put Huawei on an export blacklist in 2019 and barred it from accessing technology of US origin, impeding its ability to design its own chips and source components from outside vendors. US President Joe Biden's administration has given no indication it will reverse Trump's sanctions. The blacklist also barred Google from providing technical support to new Huawei phone models and access to Google Mobile Services, the bundle of developer services upon which most Android apps are based.
Ren's also said the software push would depend on finding the right business model and that the company should adopt an open source approach, calling on staff to "absorb nutrients" through open source communities. He said the company's Welink business communication platform relied on traditional software licensing, unsuited to cloud computing and inferior to rival products. Given the difficulty of working in the US, Ren's note said the company should strengthen its position at home and build up its territory with a view to possibly excluding the US. "Once we dominate Europe, the Asia Pacific and Africa, if US standards don't match ours, and we can't enter the US, then the US can't enter our territory," the note said.
