China supports Huawei to defend rights by law

Responding to Google's partial suspension of Huawei business, Lu Kang, spokesperson for the Foreign Ministry, said on Monday: "We have read reports and noted that Google has suspended business with Huawei requiring the transfer of hardware, software and technical services and suspended the provision of relevant services to Huawei."

We will formally confirm this matter and follow the development of the situation. At the same time, China supports Chinese enterprises to take up legal arms to defend their legitimate rights, Lu added.

Huawei Technologies Co said on Monday that it will continue to provide security updates and after-sales services to all its existing Huawei and Honor brand smartphone and tablet products, covering those that have been sold and that are still in stock globally.

US tech companies began to freeze the supply of components and software to Huawei Technologies after the US trade blacklist, according to a Bloomberg report on Monday.

Chipmakers including Intel, Qualcomm, Xilinx and Broadcom will not supply Huawei until further notice, the report said.

However, blocking components to Huawei could also disrupt the businesses of American chip heavyweights like Micron Technology and slow down the rollout of 5G wireless networks, Bloomberg said, which in turn could hurt US companies that rely on the Chinese market.

In a Reuters report on Sunday, it said that Google has also suspended business with Huawei requiring the transfer of hardware, software and technical services, except those with open-source licenses publicly available.

Google China replied via email that the company is "complying with the order and reviewing the implications", The Beijing News said.

Updates for the Android will be unavailable to Huawei smartphones that run on the system, and future versions of the company's handsets will not be able to use services from Google, including the Google Play Store, Gmail and YouTube apps, which are not covered by the open-source license and require a commercial agreement with Google, Reuters report said.

Android's official account replied on Twitter Monday that while they are complying with all US government requirements, "services like Google Play and security from Google Play Protect will keep functioning on your existing Huawei device."

Huawei earlier said it had been preparing a contingency plan for such a block to Android by developing its own technology, of which some is already being used in products sold in China, said the Reuters report.

The impact is limited in the Chinese market, as most of Google's services have alternatives offered by domestic competitors like Tencent and Baidu.

However, Huawei's European market could be affected as Huawei licenses these services from Google in Europe.

Editor: Wang Shixue