Huawei Banks on Strong Smartphone Growth Despite Blacklist
- Huawei strategy head says ban impact ‘less than $10 billion’
- Smartphone maker to rely on home market, in-house software
Huawei gets roughly half of its revenue from its smartphone division.
Photographer: Michaela Handrek-Rehle/BloombergHuawei Technologies Co. expects smartphone shipments to grow 20% next year -- about the same pace as in 2019 -- even if it’s blocked from the latest Google software, suggesting the Trump administration efforts to contain the company’s rise may not be working.
The world’s largest smartphone maker after Samsung Electronics Co. can rely on its massive home market and in-house software to drive a one-fifth rise in 2020 unit growth, said Will Zhang, Huawei’s president of corporate strategy. Sourcing the hardware for smartphone manufacturing wasn’t a problem because of the availability of global supply, he told Bloomberg News. Billionaire founder Ren Zhengfei later chimed in to say the Chinese giant should manage to move 240 million to 250 million devices in 2019, a rise of as much as 21% from last year.