Huawei ban will delay vital 5G roll-out, warns Qualcomm boss

A BAN on Huawei equipment risks leaving Europe trailing behind the US on 5G technology, the European chief executive of mobile chip giant Qualcomm has warned.

Enrico Salvatori said that “operators have been very vocal and direct that without Huawei, [there] would be a significant delay”.

He added: “Europe overall doesn’t want to make the same mistake we did with 4G – we were almost two years late to North America.”

Huawei network equipment is already banned in the US on security grounds. However, American operators, which make bigger profit margins than their European counterparts, are racing ahead to 5G by investing heavily with other suppliers such as Ericsson and Nokia.

San Diego-based Qualcomm, which designs chips used in wireless modems and processors in smartphones, has been at the forefront of the latest generation of mobile technology.

Its chips are set to appear in many of the first wave of 5G phones and can connect to network equipment from any supplier.

Last week, it settled a major patent dispute with Apple, which has fallen behind rivals in preparations for 5G due to hostilities with Qualcomm.

The technology should allow download speeds up to 100 times faster than today, as well as accelerate technologies like driverless cars and the internet of things.

For mobile operators, its main benefit may be a massive boost to network capacity as it uses scarce airwaves more efficiently than 4G, allowing them to cope with rocketing demand for high-definition video.

Washington has been lobbying allies in Europe to shun Huawei over concerns about cyber espionage.

It claims Chinese companies such as Huawei may be obliged to spy for Beijing and steal trade secrets – an accusation that Huawei has rejected.

Despite being a Us-headquartered company, Qualcomm has largely remained on the sidelines of the debate.

“It is critical for Europe to stay in sync with 5G deployment,” Mr Salvatori said. “We can expected to have many new industrial operators. That is why the time to market is critical, for competing against not only the US but China who are super-aggressive.”

Mr Salvatori said Qualcomm continues to work with “different vendors, who are all equally important”.

UK mobile networks have been particularly outspoken about any ban on Huawei.

The Department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport is working on a farreaching supply chain review into Britain’s telecoms infrastructure that could decide Huawei’s role in UK networks.

The European Commission has so far ignored US calls to ban Huawei as it announced a series of security recom- mendations for 5G networks.

In its guidance for the roll-out of 5G, the commission said member states must assess cyber threats for themselves. It said that information should be shared among EU countries by July 15 as part of a co-ordinated effort to develop a “toolbox of mitigating measures” by the end of the year to combat cyber security risks across the EU.