U.S. Chipmakers Are Lobbying To Ease The Ban On Huawei

U.S chip suppliers, including Intel and Qualcomm, are in the process of pressing Washington to ease the ban of selling products to Huawei even though the Chinese giant itself avoids government lobbying.

Intel, Qualcomm, and Xilinx Are Lobbying To Ease The Ban

Top U.S. chip manufacturers Xilinx Inc and Intel's executives participated in a meeting late last month with the Department of Commerce to talk about the backlist's placement of Huawei.

This ban does not allow suppliers from the U.S to trade with Huawei ( the largest telecommunications company in the world) without Washington's special approval. They put that ban in place over some allegedly national security threats from the Chinese company.

Some also say that Qualcomm is also pressing the Department of Commerce on this issue.

The chip makers put forward the argument that selling products of Huawei like computer servers and smartphones only use common market parts. And those don't pose the security concerns like the 5G networking equipment of the Chinese technology company.

One commented that it is not about going easy on Huawei but protecting the interest of U.S companies.

In the 70 billion dollars Huawei used to buy components last year, about 11 billion dollars went to American companies such as Intel and Qualcomm. For example, Qualcomm wants to continue to sell its chips for Huawei to use in common devices such as smartwatches and phones.

The SIA ( the association of semiconductor company) confirmed that it scheduled consultations with Washington as the representative of the industry to summarise and discuss with the politicians about the ban's impact.

Jimmy Goodrich ( SIA global policy's vice president) said that technologies aren't related to the security risk should not fall in the order's scope. He also said that they had sent this point of view to Washington.

Google Also Wants To Resume Sale To Huawei

Google, a company that sells software, technical services, and hardware to Huawei, also want to keep selling its products to the Chinese giant. That is what Liang Hua (Chairman of Huawei) said to reporters not long ago.

The search giant said in its statement that it is working with the Department of Commerce so that it will comply with the ban.

A representative of the Department of Commerce said that they routinely answer to questions and requests from companies about the regulatory requirements' scope. He also added that these conversations do not affect the actions of law enforcement.

Qualcomm, Xilinx, and Intel all declined to give their comment.

In a recent interview with Andrew Williamson (public affairs vice president of the Chinese giant), he said that Huawei had not asked others to lobby for it.

One month after the ban, Huawei has not discussed with Washington about it.

They had been reducing their lobbying activities even before the official order. In 2018, Huawei laid off five employees in its office in Washington, including the external affairs' vice president, and reduced its lobbying expenditures significantly.

However, Huawei has pulled out a fierce legal fight together with many public relations actions to defend against the allegations of Washington. Back in February, it ran an ad with prominent U.S. newspapers following by a series of interviews to soften its image in the U.S.

Still, there are real repercussions to the ban.

Broadcom shocked everyone in the chipmaking industry by forecasting that the back listing and U.S-China trade war would make it loose 2 billion dollars on sales in this year.

On the 20th of May, the Department of Commerce announced that it would give out temporary licenses to enable Huawei to buy  U.S. goods to help it maintains its services and products for existing customers