Yes, I'll be really interested to see what happens in Europe in particular as the US has longer term relationships with governments and others there and you would think this would lead to fewer contracts (at least on the govt/large company front). That said, many of my colleagues in Europe even though they know about Huawei's potential transfer of data to China and are no fans of the Chinese government still choose their phones based on price and many of the countries I visit (Kyiv, France, etc.) have nice Huawei showrooms and seem to be doing good business.
When asking colleagues about why they would choose Huawei aside from price (all of them could afford Apple if they wanted) the common response I got was that everyone is spying on everyone anyways and usually a joke about is China really any worse than the U.S.
> joke about is China really any worse than the U.S.
Most people of my generation didn’t see that much of the cold war but still understood what was done during that time on both side, and that from very early in their life.
A lot of people are not joking when they say they don’t trust the US, and tend to pay more attention to the control the US has on the tech and media sectors, even if the US is a long time ally.
I live in a Chinese dominated country. I can tell you this is because of the absurd nationalistic view that the Chinese hold. For example, I know atleast 5 co-workers who sold their iPhones to get a Huawei when the sanction was made. Part of the reason was Huawei phones' prices (even new ones) drastically dropped when the announcement of no more Android support was made, so these guys (and girls) got it at a super good price, but most of it is due to the nationalistic view that they hold towards China. "US is evil, I should support China at such times!" this was the explanation I was given. I was blown away that people could be so nationalistic. I'm neither Chinese nor American, so it was interesting to observe from a neutral standpoint, such nationalistic attitude from people who held double degrees / PhDs who simply believed US is evil and China is the victim. This was very noticeable when Huawei's CFO was arrested. I tried to understand why, so I threw many arguments at them such as Huawei was actually caught sending data back to 3rd party servers in China and I even tried explaining maybe the sanction is on them because they broke the law/agreement w/ the US. But it didn't seem to change anything about the way they thought. They still went ahead and purchased Huawei products like crazy.
I live in India and not a big fan of China but I purchased a Huawei phone recently. I think Huwei benefited from the publicity they got through US campaign against them.
I was wondering whether it would be a benefit for them to be knocked by the American govt in some places. I guessed for sure in the ME but I'm a bit surprised about India, I would have figured they would be more on the US side. Or is it that they just benefited from increased name recognition rather than name recognition tied to being harried by the US
>but I'm a bit surprised about India, I would have figured they would be more on the US side.
giving US support of Pakistan? :) While China, despite potentially having points of contention with India, seems to have at least for now decided to not angry up the Indian tiger.
The U.S. gives support to lots of people, including India. I wouldn't think that'd be that big a deal. Plus, the US aid to Pakistan is pretty unwilling and not because we support them over India but because we need them to not give terrorists shelter (more than they already do I guess)
"The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) compiled and published a data in 2015 indicating that from the period 1946-2012, India has been the recipient of highest aid from United States. The amount of economic aid, adjusted to inflation then, was reported to be USD 65.1 billion"
It would have been nice to have US manufacturer of Android phones, not only iOS devices. Sadly, no such thing existed (Google Pixel is not what I meant).
Regardless of your political views, Taiwan is a different China from mainland China. There are a lot of initiatives to promote a Taiwanese identity such as MIT (Made in Taiwan) and Taiwanization.
That is the problem, the Chinese view is that ethnic Chinese is Chinese. The word Chinese has double meaning and get muddle up a lot. Unfortunately there doesn't seems to be another accepted English word for ethnic Chinese.
China benefits from conflict with America. It foments exactly this kind of reactionary nationalism.
The US during the Cold War could rally around large national programs (e.g. space race) and wars (e.g. Vietnam) because there was a foreign enemy. That enemy could be foreign actor (Russia) or an idea (communism) or a person (Saddam, for example.)
The spirit of "do your part" is deeply appealing to our core desire to form tribe. The strongest sense of Us comes from a Them.
So does US also similarly benefit from having this conflict with China? Seems like people don't really care about it as much as they do about the opposing party.
Like some other commenters, I'd also like to know which this mythical "chinese dominated country" is. Why not just say I'm from X, rather than being so cryptic? So many anecdotal propaganda start off with such vague comments.
> I can tell you this is because of the absurd nationalistic view that the Chinese hold.
What "absurd" nationalistic views do they hold that you or anyone else doesn't hold? I think everyone, including you, hold the same absurd nationalist views. I suspect that's why you wrote such a strange anti-chinese comment.
> For example, I know atleast 5 co-workers who sold their iPhones to get a Huawei when the sanction was made.
That's it? In a trade war with the US, "nationalistics" chinese are buying chinese products? In the US, we had "buy american" for decades - even without the trade war.
> "US is evil, I should support China at such times!"
You mean during a US led trade war against china, the chinese are calling the US evil and supporting their own nation? Do you think they should support the US?
> This was very noticeable when Huawei's CFO was arrested. I tried to understand why, so I threw many arguments at them such as Huawei was actually caught sending data back to 3rd party servers in China ...
But your arguments had nothing to do with the CFO's arrest. The CFO was arrested because she allegedly lied to banks in order to evade sanctions on Iran and trade with them.
There are so many vague "anecdotal" anti-chinese propaganda all over social media that I'm having a hard time believing its not coordinated in some manner.
You are trying to make your "chinese" collegues look bad but they are acting like every person would. I'm sure if your "chinese dominated country" were being attacked with a trade war, you'd side with your own nation right?
Just know that, if people upvote you, it's not because they think: "I think this constitutes a plausible explanation of the revenue increase being reported on", it's because they think: "I like the fact that this portrayal makes this outgroup of mine look bad".
> because of the absurd nationalistic view that the Chinese hold
Nothing absurd about it. The US government is trying to coerce the Chinese government. Great time for them to feel nationalistic.
> I tried to understand why, so I threw many arguments at them such as Huawei was actually caught sending data back to 3rd party servers in China and I even tried explaining maybe the sanction is on them because they broke the law/agreement w/ the US.
The core of that argument rests on the idea that Chinese people should accept that the US can dictate how they deal with Iran. And that the US can choose how to enforce compliance to that law. Both of those assumptions are flaky at a basic Chinese-people-should-agree-with-this level.
International rule of law would be nice, but the US doesn't particularly constrain themselves by rule of law in the international sphere - they've invaded a lot of countries on flimsy pretexts. That is much worse than trading with people. After that example, why should the Chinese worry about international rules that are inconvenient? For all the fact that their government is brutal and terrifying it hasn't invaded anywhere in the middle east in the last 20 years.
Isn’t the core of the issue more that Huawei defrauded some US banks by promising not to use their money to do business with Iran, then went ahead and did it anyways, leading to the banks in question being fined by the US?
That is what the US wants the core of the issue to be. The actual core of the issue isn't automatically set because the US has a preference. It seems completely reasonable that the Chinese would see a different core issue related to the US throwing their weight around.
This isn't a case that is being put through the Chinese court system. That suggests that the Chinese government doesn't see a problem with Huawei's actions. The US banks getting to have a legal say beyond that is a very questionable position given that they presumably knew who they were lending money to. The fact that under US law nothing is out of the ordinary is cool and all, but Meng Whanzhou isn't meant to be subject to US law. She's a Chinese businesswoman running a Chinese business from China.
Call me crazy, but she should be subject to Chinese law. And I can easily see why Chinese people might think that.
That doesn’t make sense to me. Of course if you do business with the US you are subject to US law. And if you travel to somewhere with an extradition treaty with the US, well, it shouldn’t be hard to guess what will happen. If I defrauded a Chinese bank I would expect to be arrested if I traveled somewhere with extradition to China.
What do you mean about the US banks having a legal say? The government is the one doing the prosecuting.
And if they were lied to, then how would they know that their money would be used to violate sanctions? Are you saying that they should have known that Huawei was lying, therefore it’s their own fault? Maybe that’s the case, but it doesn’t have any bearing on whether a crime was committed.
Edit: And that doesn’t change the fact that your original comment was highly misleading. I’m sure you can come up with some argument against the US position, but you should have done that in the first place instead of posting a strawman.
> If I defrauded a Chinese bank I would expect to be arrested if I traveled somewhere with extradition to China.
Yes, but if the charge was that you were engaged in trade with Taiwan (or recognising Taiwan as an independent state) that would be equally outrageous.
> What do you mean about the US banks having a legal say? The government is the one doing the prosecuting.
I must have misunderstood what you said. I thought the banks in the US being fined was relevant.
> Are you saying that they should have known that Huawei was lying, therefore it’s their own fault?
Pretty much. Joys of capitalism. If this sort of thing is legal in the place where Huawei is sourcing their management from then they should have expected it. If somebody enters into an unenforceable contract and the other party starts laughing and ignoring it, that is on the parties involved.
> Maybe that’s the case, but it doesn’t have any bearing on whether a crime was committed.
It totally does have a bearing. America doesn't get to decide what a crime is for Chinese companies. The US can choose to hinder business between US companies and Chinese companies, can choose to restrict Chinese corporate activity on US soil and can negotiate for whatever they like. But grabbing people on a connecting flight as the opening play is going to stir up the nationalists for good reasons.
> Edit: And that doesn’t change the fact that your original comment was highly misleading. I’m sure you can come up with some argument against the US position, but you should have done that in the first place instead of posting a strawman.
US law is not some natural law of the world, and a US judge making a ruling is something that only US citizens should have to knuckle under and accept. If someone from China gets unhappy that suddenly their business leaders are being messed with on the orders of a US judge then it is totally understandable.
Again, she wasn’t charged with trading with Iran. Since you can’t seem to understand that simple point, I don’t see this conversation as productive any longer.
If trading with Taiwan were illegal in China and I wanted to do business in China of course I wouldn’t do both and set foot in China. That’s the reality with working with any country, including city state Singapore. I also wouldn’t expect any of the same luxuries that the western legal systems might provide.
But the CFO was arrested for financial fraud, and I would also be expected to be arrested if I engaged in financial lying with China, whether I was in China at the time of lying or not.
My understanding is this - the core of the argument is that a profit making entity from China violated a foreign law in a foreign land. And people were getting nationalistic about it without understanding that an agreement means you agreed on something (in this case, not to do something) and violating that has consequences as per foreign law because the company is operating in a foreign land that isn't their own.
For example, if some company from my country violated US (or wherever they operated) law and got penalized for that (and they have been in the past, actually), I wouldn't be like "screw the US! I must support my country!!". I would just think "Oh, probably they shouldn't have done that" and move on. All I'm saying is it's surprising to me to see this kind of nationalistic knee-jerk reaction en masse. I have never witnessed it personally until now, so I shared my mere observation.
Huawei isn't being penalised though; this is a direct charge against Meng. The US doesn't need the CFO to be in the courtroom to press charges against Huawei. The focus is a little different; this is much more personal.
If it were just a charge against Huawei then yeah, a nationalistic response would be a little silly.
The arrest of Meng seems to me like the Roman and Byzantine practice for taking hostages from families of foreign leaders to ensure their loyalty and obedience to their interests.
As a Chinese who spent 7 years in the US and now back in China. I can tell the difference between nationalistic view then (before 2010) and now. Common people used to blindly believe the superiority of the system, but now they believe it with evidence. All things considered, more people are well-educated and they do not blindly believe anything any more. So if they do like something, it must have some real benefit. Actually, Huawei has its own PR crisis just a couple of weeks ago when media exposed that one former Huawei employee was wrongfully jailed for 251 days. I have friends switch from Huawei and to Huawei with all kinds of reasons, but mostly, it is performance and price ratio.
Huawei is (essentially) a state-owned company - I don't think they are calculating revenue using external auditor and comply with GAAP. It is not comparable with any publicly traded companies.
I've heard about quite a few times KPMG has worked hand in hand with the people it was supposed to be auditing so I'm not sure that's a big plus (ex. S. Africa scandals)
Their revenue is below expectations. Their revenue growth is lower than a year ago. And they lowered expectations for 2020. In other words, the revenue is projected to hit $122B because of the US sanctions, not despite it. Otherwise, the revenue, growth and expectations would have been a lot higher.
Wish the "news" would just print the facts without the spin for a change.
64 comments
[ 3.5 ms ] story [ 129 ms ] threadDisclaimer: I work in Cisco’s SP routing group.
Let us hope sanctions don't fall apart as a tool, lest we end up with a much less pleasant tool: war.
11% of their business came from other south pacific countries (which they have a large stake in)
6% from the Americas.
30% of their revenue came from Europe-Africa-Middle East, which is the real "battle ground" for them.
https://www.huawei.com/us/press-events/annual-report/2018
Rate of growth slower than expected, according the the article.
When asking colleagues about why they would choose Huawei aside from price (all of them could afford Apple if they wanted) the common response I got was that everyone is spying on everyone anyways and usually a joke about is China really any worse than the U.S.
Most people of my generation didn’t see that much of the cold war but still understood what was done during that time on both side, and that from very early in their life.
A lot of people are not joking when they say they don’t trust the US, and tend to pay more attention to the control the US has on the tech and media sectors, even if the US is a long time ally.
At the moment, American bullying is not providing that.
giving US support of Pakistan? :) While China, despite potentially having points of contention with India, seems to have at least for now decided to not angry up the Indian tiger.
"The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) compiled and published a data in 2015 indicating that from the period 1946-2012, India has been the recipient of highest aid from United States. The amount of economic aid, adjusted to inflation then, was reported to be USD 65.1 billion"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_aid_to_India
Huh?
Kuomintang for a long time considered themselves a "tru Chinese", carriers of the spirit of the Chinese nation (as opposd to those godless commies).
That is the problem, the Chinese view is that ethnic Chinese is Chinese. The word Chinese has double meaning and get muddle up a lot. Unfortunately there doesn't seems to be another accepted English word for ethnic Chinese.
The US during the Cold War could rally around large national programs (e.g. space race) and wars (e.g. Vietnam) because there was a foreign enemy. That enemy could be foreign actor (Russia) or an idea (communism) or a person (Saddam, for example.)
The spirit of "do your part" is deeply appealing to our core desire to form tribe. The strongest sense of Us comes from a Them.
Like some other commenters, I'd also like to know which this mythical "chinese dominated country" is. Why not just say I'm from X, rather than being so cryptic? So many anecdotal propaganda start off with such vague comments.
> I can tell you this is because of the absurd nationalistic view that the Chinese hold.
What "absurd" nationalistic views do they hold that you or anyone else doesn't hold? I think everyone, including you, hold the same absurd nationalist views. I suspect that's why you wrote such a strange anti-chinese comment.
> For example, I know atleast 5 co-workers who sold their iPhones to get a Huawei when the sanction was made.
That's it? In a trade war with the US, "nationalistics" chinese are buying chinese products? In the US, we had "buy american" for decades - even without the trade war.
> "US is evil, I should support China at such times!"
You mean during a US led trade war against china, the chinese are calling the US evil and supporting their own nation? Do you think they should support the US?
> This was very noticeable when Huawei's CFO was arrested. I tried to understand why, so I threw many arguments at them such as Huawei was actually caught sending data back to 3rd party servers in China ...
But your arguments had nothing to do with the CFO's arrest. The CFO was arrested because she allegedly lied to banks in order to evade sanctions on Iran and trade with them.
There are so many vague "anecdotal" anti-chinese propaganda all over social media that I'm having a hard time believing its not coordinated in some manner.
You are trying to make your "chinese" collegues look bad but they are acting like every person would. I'm sure if your "chinese dominated country" were being attacked with a trade war, you'd side with your own nation right?
Nothing absurd about it. The US government is trying to coerce the Chinese government. Great time for them to feel nationalistic.
> I tried to understand why, so I threw many arguments at them such as Huawei was actually caught sending data back to 3rd party servers in China and I even tried explaining maybe the sanction is on them because they broke the law/agreement w/ the US.
The core of that argument rests on the idea that Chinese people should accept that the US can dictate how they deal with Iran. And that the US can choose how to enforce compliance to that law. Both of those assumptions are flaky at a basic Chinese-people-should-agree-with-this level.
International rule of law would be nice, but the US doesn't particularly constrain themselves by rule of law in the international sphere - they've invaded a lot of countries on flimsy pretexts. That is much worse than trading with people. After that example, why should the Chinese worry about international rules that are inconvenient? For all the fact that their government is brutal and terrifying it hasn't invaded anywhere in the middle east in the last 20 years.
Also then you agree that Chinese govt shouldn't be allowed to commit genocide against Uighurs?
Your characterization seems a bit misleading.
This isn't a case that is being put through the Chinese court system. That suggests that the Chinese government doesn't see a problem with Huawei's actions. The US banks getting to have a legal say beyond that is a very questionable position given that they presumably knew who they were lending money to. The fact that under US law nothing is out of the ordinary is cool and all, but Meng Whanzhou isn't meant to be subject to US law. She's a Chinese businesswoman running a Chinese business from China.
Call me crazy, but she should be subject to Chinese law. And I can easily see why Chinese people might think that.
What do you mean about the US banks having a legal say? The government is the one doing the prosecuting.
And if they were lied to, then how would they know that their money would be used to violate sanctions? Are you saying that they should have known that Huawei was lying, therefore it’s their own fault? Maybe that’s the case, but it doesn’t have any bearing on whether a crime was committed.
Edit: And that doesn’t change the fact that your original comment was highly misleading. I’m sure you can come up with some argument against the US position, but you should have done that in the first place instead of posting a strawman.
Yes, but if the charge was that you were engaged in trade with Taiwan (or recognising Taiwan as an independent state) that would be equally outrageous.
> What do you mean about the US banks having a legal say? The government is the one doing the prosecuting.
I must have misunderstood what you said. I thought the banks in the US being fined was relevant.
> Are you saying that they should have known that Huawei was lying, therefore it’s their own fault?
Pretty much. Joys of capitalism. If this sort of thing is legal in the place where Huawei is sourcing their management from then they should have expected it. If somebody enters into an unenforceable contract and the other party starts laughing and ignoring it, that is on the parties involved.
> Maybe that’s the case, but it doesn’t have any bearing on whether a crime was committed.
It totally does have a bearing. America doesn't get to decide what a crime is for Chinese companies. The US can choose to hinder business between US companies and Chinese companies, can choose to restrict Chinese corporate activity on US soil and can negotiate for whatever they like. But grabbing people on a connecting flight as the opening play is going to stir up the nationalists for good reasons.
> Edit: And that doesn’t change the fact that your original comment was highly misleading. I’m sure you can come up with some argument against the US position, but you should have done that in the first place instead of posting a strawman.
US law is not some natural law of the world, and a US judge making a ruling is something that only US citizens should have to knuckle under and accept. If someone from China gets unhappy that suddenly their business leaders are being messed with on the orders of a US judge then it is totally understandable.
But the CFO was arrested for financial fraud, and I would also be expected to be arrested if I engaged in financial lying with China, whether I was in China at the time of lying or not.
For example, if some company from my country violated US (or wherever they operated) law and got penalized for that (and they have been in the past, actually), I wouldn't be like "screw the US! I must support my country!!". I would just think "Oh, probably they shouldn't have done that" and move on. All I'm saying is it's surprising to me to see this kind of nationalistic knee-jerk reaction en masse. I have never witnessed it personally until now, so I shared my mere observation.
If it were just a charge against Huawei then yeah, a nationalistic response would be a little silly.
Americans could be patriotic (GOOD!)
Chinese could only be nationalistic (BAD!)
at least china don't try to fuck you up if you want to create global giants
US will sue you if you try to compete with them
i'm glad they elected trump, now the whole word know exactly how the US is playing, with their own rules, created for their own profit
How does one steal technology that no other company posses?
2. "and comply with GAAP" - they don't. Accounting in China is IFRS based, as far as I know.
Wish the "news" would just print the facts without the spin for a change.