New problems for Huawei in France and Germany

We don’t foresee calling on Huawei for 5G. We are working with our traditional partners — they are Ericsson and Noki

Stephane Richard, CEO, Orange

frankfurt — Huawei faces fresh challenges in Europe after France’s Orange said it would not hire the Chinese firm to build its next-generation network and Germany’s Deutsche Telekom announced it would review its vendor strategy.

The shift by the national market leaders, both partly state owned, follows Huawei’s exclusion on national security grounds by some US allies, led by Australia, from building their fifth-generation (5G) mobile networks.

US officials have briefed allies that Huawei is ultimately at the beck and call of the Chinese state, while warning that its network equipment may contain “back doors” that could open them up to cyber espionage.

Huawei says those concerns are unfounded. Tensions have been heightened by the arrest of Huawei’s chief financial officer in Canada for possible extradition to the United States.

“We don’t foresee calling on Huawei for 5G,” Orange CEO Stephane Richard told reporters in Paris.

“We are working with our traditional partners — they are Ericsson and Nokia.”

Richard said he considered the security concerns to be legitimate: “I absolutely understand that all of our countries, and the French authorities, are preoccupied. We are too.”

Responding, Huawei said it was not a supplier to Orange’s existing 4G network in France and would not feature in the company’s 5G plans in France. Huawei does supply Orange’s networks outside France and expects to be involved in 5G there, it said.

Deutsche Telekom, Europe’s largest telecoms company, said it was reviewing its vendor plans given the debate on the security of Chinese network gear in Germany and the other European markets where it operates. “Deutsche Telekom takes the global discussion about the security of network equipment from Chinese vendors very seriously,” the company said in response to a Reuters query.

Telekom already pursues a multivendor strategy, relying above all on equipment from Ericsson, Nokia, Cisco and Huawei. “Nevertheless we are reassessing our procurement strategy,” it said.