Huawei

SoftBank gives U.S. right to OK Sprint board member -- report

In a further attempt to ease national security concerns over its proposed acquisition of Sprint, Japan-based SoftBank has agreed to give the U.S. government the right to approve one of the members SoftBank would appoint to Sprint's board of directors, according to a report.

The U.S.-approved board member would make sure a SoftBank-owned Sprint honored whatever security agreement is hammered out with U.S. regulators, The Wall Street Journal reported late Wednesday, citing unnamed sources.

Regulators are also seeking oversight of Sprint's network equipment purchases to prevent gear from Chinese suppliers Huawei Technologies and ZTE … Read more

India investigates Huawei, ZTE gear -- report

The Indian government is launching a investigation over Huawei and ZTE equipment, following increased scrutiny on China's alleged involvement in cyberspying.

Sina Tech reported this on Thursday, citing an official from India's Department of Telecommunications. The official said the ministry knows about the concerns of Indian intelligence agencies and os expediting the developing of systems for testing the networking equipment of foreign manufacturers, which could also include the likes of Cisco Systems and Alcatel.

A lab reportedly will be set up in Bangalore, where the gear will be tested.

Huawei W1 Windows phone lands at Walmart this month

Huawei's first Windows Phone 8 handset, the Huawei W1, lands later this month in select Walmart stores and on Walmart.com.

The handset, known globally as the Huawei Ascend W1, by the way, is an entry-level device with a 4-inch LCD display, a 1.2GHZ dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor, and a 5-megapixel camera that can capture 720p HD video.

That's not all, of course. The specs continue with a VGA front-facing camera, and the phone comes with an Adreno 305 400MHz GPU. Although there will only be 1.7GB of available user storage, the W1 will come … Read more

Huawei founder defends company in rare public appearance

Huawei CEO and founder Ren Zhengfei broke his silence and publicly denied that his company is involved with cybersecurity threats directed at the U.S.

Ren emerged from behind his veil of secrecy and publicly addressed the media in a rare appearance in New Zealand, where Huawei had just won a contract to build a 4G LTE network, according to Reuters.

While Huawei has grown to be the second-largest telecommunications vendor in the world, the company has had difficulty breaking into the U.S. market due to security concerns expressed by the U.S. government and the belief that Huawei … Read more

Huawei CEO: Next boss won't come from my family

Telecom equipment maker Huawei Technologies won't be a family-run business for long.

In a letter sent to employees on Sunday and obtained by Reuters, Huawei CEO and founder Ren Zhengfei said that no one in his family will succeed him because he doesn't believe any relatives have all of the personal qualities necessary to effectively lead the company.

"Huawei's successor should not only have vision, character and ambition, like what we've said before, but also a good global perspective and the acumen to drive the business," Ren wrote, according to Reuters. "My family … Read more

Apple, Samsung's next critical play: Affordable smartphones

If Apple and Samsung want to see their stock prices rise higher, their smartphone prices will have to fall lower.

Both companies have established a dominant position in the wireless industry thanks to their buzzworthy, feature-packed, and polished flagship smartphones. The iPhone 5 and the Galaxy S3 (soon to be displaced by the Galaxy S4) reign atop the sales charts, allowing the two to control more than half the smartphone market and virtually all of the profits.

But a look at both of their most recent financial results show that dominating the high-end smartphone market is no longer enough to … Read more

Smartphones outpace feature phones for first time ever

It seemed inevitable, and now it has happened: for the first time ever, feature phones have taken a backseat to smartphones in terms of quantities shipped.

In the first quarter of 2013, device makers shipped 216.2 million smartphones worldwide, a volume that accounted for 51.6 percent of total global shipments and that marked the first time smartphones have claimed more than half of all quarterly shipments, according to market researcher IDC.

The smartphone market grew 41.6 percent compared with the first quarter of 2012, but declined 5.1 percent from the shipment tally for the fourth quarter … Read more

Huawei exec: We're 'not interested' in the U.S.

A Huawei senior executive said Tuesday that the giant Chinese telecom gear maker is "not interested" in the U.S. market any longer.

According to reports by Reuters and the Financial Times, Eric Xu, Huawei executive vice president and one of its three rotating chief executives, expressed exasperation at inquiries by U.S. lawmakers into concerns that the company's gear could be used to snoop on American companies or individuals. Last fall, the House Intelligence committee issued an extensive report discouraging American companies from buying Huawei gear over espionage fears.

At an analyst conference Tuesday in Shenzhen, … Read more

Huawei debuts 5-inch A199 for China

Huawei has announced (translate) a midrange Android smartphone for China and emerging markets in the form of the 5-inch A199.

Powered by Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, the Huawei A199 also features Huawei's custom Emotion 1.5 UI. On hardware, the handset falls in the mid-to-high end of the spectrum with its quad-core 1.5GHz processor, 2GB RAM, 8GB internal storage, and 8.0-megapixel rear camera.

Whereas most 5-inch smartphones tend to offer a 1080p HD display, the Huawei A199 comes with a still respectable 720p resolution screen. Additional hardware includes a 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera, a 2,150mAh … Read more

EU puts Huawei, ZTE in crosshairs. Who will pull trigger?

The European Commission would like to prepare a case against China-based companies Huawei and ZTE over the possibility of unfair business practices, but it needs help from technology companies that are unwilling to get involved, according to a new report.

Reuters, which claims to have spoken to people with knowledge of the issue, reported that the EC would like to investigate whether Huawei and ZTE have been unfairly using state subsidies to undercut prices offered by European companies. The EC is the executive arm of the European Union.

For the trade investigation to move forward, the EC needs to have … Read more