Huawei counts cost of Western bans as UK business withers
- Reference: 1756807275
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2025/09/02/huawei_uk_decline/
- Source link:
In its latest profit and loss accounts for the year ended December 31, 2024, Huawei Technologies UK generated just £188.2 million ($159.6 million) in revenues versus £1.26 billion ($1.7 billion) in 2019. Sales peaked in the prior year at £1.28 billion.
Huawei's farewell to Android isn't a marketing move, it's chess [1]READ MORE
"Revenue in 2024 decreased by 18 percent, primarily due to planned downsizing of the business following UK and US restrictions," Huawei said in the report filed at Companies House last month.
Anti-Huawei sentiment began in earnest stateside in 2019 when President Donald Trump [2]declared a national emergency by signing an executive order that effectively prohibited the use of Chinese telecom gear by US corporations. Pressure was then placed on [3]allies to follow suit. President Biden [4]didn't loosen screws during his administration and now Trump is back.
The UK Telecommunications (Security) Act received [5]Royal Assent in November 2021 , outlawing the purchase of Huawei networking kit to build 5G networks. Local companies were ordered to [6]eradicate any Huawei tech from their 5G infrastructure by 2027 .
[7]
Huawei, which previously agreed to annual checks on its products by GCHQ, the British intelligence and security agency, has [8]consistently denied allegations of spying for the Chinese Communist Party . Its software development practices were [9]criticized by the Huawei Cyber Security Evaluation Centre , though backdoors in its hardware were not identified.
[10]
[11]
Nevertheless, the business that once flew high in Britain [12]shut down its Enterprise tech operations – servers, networking, and storage – in the country and has since been reduced to servicing network products still in use and selling lines of consumer tech.
[13]Beijing doesn't want Nvidia's H20s anywhere near sensitive government workloads
[14]London's poor 5G blamed on spectrum, investment, and timing of Huawei ban
[15]Huawei's latest notebook shows China is still generations behind in chipmaking
[16]Trump tariff turmoil hurting global smartphone market, but hitting US hardest
In addition to the latest revenue drop for Huawei UK in 2024 – down 18 percent year-on-year – the profit and loss accounts confirm that gross profit fell 21.4 percent to £24.2 million ($32.7 million) due to "changes in sales mix," and profit after tax tumbled more than 26 percent to £6.2 million ($8.4 million).
Congress to Commerce: Sanction more Chinese chip firms to stop Huawei's evasion [17]READ MORE
Huawei said its UK forecast for the current year was set in anticipation of risks in the telecoms sectors and "challenging" economic conditions, as well as "restrictions placed on the business by US and UK legislation and regulations."
The Reg attended a Huawei event on London during July and was shown a range of new consumer tech gear including a foldable smartphone and other interesting gadgets. None were available for sale locally, though staff hinted this could change. Huawei continues to sell phones, wearables, PCs, and tablets to Brits.
Huawei employed just 176 people in the UK in 2024, versus 260 in the prior year. Back in 2019, it had 885 on the payroll in Britain. This is what happens when technology and politics are intertwined.
[18]
Steve Brazier, Informa Fellow and co-founder at Canappi, told us:
"Following the UK government's decision to restrict Huawei's market access on political grounds, the company's reduced presence in Britain has contributed to [19]delays in 5G infrastructure deployment and limitations in network performance . Whilst the full economic cost of these delays—in terms of reduced productivity and missed innovation opportunities remains difficult to quantify, the impact has been considerable.
"Despite these setbacks in the UK market, Huawei has demonstrated remarkable resilience globally, re-establishing itself as a major force across telecommunications infrastructure, artificial intelligence, Internet of Things solutions, mobile devices, and semiconductor technology. It is one of the world's most important tech companies."
[20]
Huawei's business globally grew [21]22 percent year-on-year in 2024 as it concentrates on Asia Pacific and other regions outside of the West.
We asked Huawei to comment. ®
Get our [22]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/28/opinion_column_huawei_harmony_os/
[2] https://www.theregister.com/2019/05/15/president_trump_huawei_emergency_ban/
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2020/01/27/uk_huawei_5g_core_decision_imminent/
[4] https://www.theregister.com/2021/03/12/biden_huawei_restrictions/
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2021/11/18/dcms_tca/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2020/07/14/huawei_ban_uk/
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aLcUlqRR5ifQvEwfL4VEQAAAAFE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2019/02/06/huawei_open_letter_uk_government/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2019/03/28/hcsec_huawei_oversight_board_savaging_annual_report/
[10] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aLcUlqRR5ifQvEwfL4VEQAAAAFE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[11] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aLcUlqRR5ifQvEwfL4VEQAAAAFE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2020/09/08/huawei_set_to_exit_server/
[13] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/12/china_nvidia_h20/
[14] https://www.theregister.com/2025/03/25/london_poor_5g_research/
[15] https://www.theregister.com/2025/06/23/huaweis_foldable_shows_china_years_behind_tsmc/
[16] https://www.theregister.com/2025/06/04/trump_tariff_turmoil_affecting_global/
[17] https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/24/congress_china_sanction_huawei/
[18] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aLcUlqRR5ifQvEwfL4VEQAAAAFE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[19] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/08/britains_5g_experience_among_the/
[20] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aLcUlqRR5ifQvEwfL4VEQAAAAFE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[21] https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/09/asia_tech_news_in_brief/
[22] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: outlawing the purchase of Huawei networking kit to build 5G networks
" Local companies were ordered to eradicate any Huawei tech from their 5G infrastructure by 2027."
Looks like they were a bit fussed...
Re: outlawing the purchase of Huawei networking kit to build 5G networks
I think you missed my point really, which was that if Huawei posed such a security risk, then why was this limited to 5G Networks?
Really this was down to protectionism, the US wanted to give companies like Qualcomm a leg up.
Tinfoil Hat time
Now that the US government has a 10% stake in Intel is anyone going to be wondering what Intel might be ordered to do?
Can we expect a blanket ban on Intel chips from non-US allied counties?
Re: Tinfoil Hat time
The US doesn't need a stake in the vendor to tamper with their tech, they were caught putting back doors into Cisco kit years ago (https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/may/12/glenn-greenwald-nsa-tampers-us-internet-routers-snowden). The US is worried that other countries will do what they've been up to for years, but they're the "good guys" so should completely be trusted with it and there's no risk of them becoming an authoritarian police state with the army on the streets, right?
Re: Tinfoil Hat time
The US doesn't have allies. It has patsies.
Re: Tinfoil Hat time
We should. Slow, poorly manufactured and compromised by the NSA.
Intel should be on the no-buy list more than Huawei, at least thier chips don't have manufacturing defects.
FUD
You can't beat a bit of Fear Uncertainty and Doubt being sown to make sure a company gets treated like a hot potato.
There seems to be a lot of stoking of tensions based on, what it seems to me at least, limited actual evidence there's shenanigans afoot.
I spend half my time at home tinkering with things to see what they do.
If you want some fun, install a PiHole and watch your network traffic.
All those "smart" devices you have are all calling home!
Re: FUD
The article is wrong. It wasn't US pressure that got Huawei banned in the UK. It was mostly UK pressure. The fear uncertainty and doubt was generated by the intelligence services. Who warned both the UK and US governments during the 2nd Obama administration. Hence the UK did a deal with Huawei to have that software centre in Oxfordshire so we could audit their software.
Boris Johnson then announced that nothing more was going to be done, after Trump had banned their kit. And there was a pretty large political backlash here, accusing him of being soft on China. Plus some grumpy public comments from "intelligence sources" making their way to the papers. Then there was a u-turn a few months later, and Johnson was immediately accused of kow-towing to Trump.
Yet in the same week France quietly banned Huawei kit, and a week or two after the Netherlands and Denmark did, with their governments partly citing warnings from UK intelligence services.
I don't know if some intelligence changed. Because pressure from Trump was unlikely to affect France, especially as Germany refused to back down and kept Huawei kit allowed for anther couple of years, even as most of the rest of the EU banned it.
The other reason was economic. If you let China subsidise their network supplier's R&D so that all your network companies go out of business, then you've got no response to future shennanigans, even if ones aren't currently happening.
But the idea that the Chinese communist party are reliable or trustworthy is utterly laughable. Even if you're not certain they're up to something now, it's clear that the policy of welcoming China into the global market has been a mistake, and short of change in the regime we're going to get twenty years of Cold War from that policy, if not an actual hot war over Taiwan. There were good reasons to try it - but vastly enriching a country run by an aggressive dictatorship has some quite serious downsides. The Party at least seemed a lot less aggressive before Xi took over, but they chose him. Even if he's purged quite a few of them since.
Re: FUD
"All those "smart" devices you have are all calling home!"
May I be the first to say, no shit Sherlock...
I wonder what the cost to the UK was
Despite all the enormous security holes and backdoors in Cisco, it gets a free pass.
The hypocrisy is on show again. Britain is a rump state.
Huawei, which previously agreed to annual checks on its products by GCHQ
Given that GCHQ didn't prevent the exfiltration of data by one of their own interns - he was only collared after the event, could you trust GCHQ to spot nefarious code before the damage is done?
[1]https://www.theregister.com/2025/06/16/gchq_intern_jailed/
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2025/06/16/gchq_intern_jailed/
Yeah, but...
The US ordered its 'allies' (using the term loosely) to block Huawei from 5G and they did. There was no more of a security issue than you get from ropey MS updates, and less than you get from NSA back doors, or in the UK's case, outsourcing govt services to France in the middle of the 'small boats' farrago.
But this is the UK, which is winding down since the sterling drop at Brexit and the blocks on migrant labour and foreign students. People are skint, companies are running on empty, services aren't working and the government have cracked down on the internet - the Golden Goose of the global economy. It doesn't really matter if the UK doesn't have 5G for a few years, if ever in non-urban areas. The economy is circling the drain and nobody is going to roll out new tech here anyway. If you develop it here, it can be sold or moved abroad. AI is a scam and there is no real roadmap of forward innovation. GAFA hasn't innovated properly in years. Just a series of scams - metaverse, NFTs, blockchain and now AI.
The one thing the UK still has is the Pi, which could be leveraged into a simpler, secure-by-design PC with a non-US OS. They might even be able to squeeze out a version without back doors for use in the RotW, although the govt. might demand UK models are hobbled. There are Pi PCs, but no real retail marketing and some of the issues of OS choice that have crippled Linux in the retail environment. If Linux had been co-created by Steve Jobs, for all his faults, it would have been an OS not a kernel, and might have sunk MS by now.
Oh, and it doesn't matter how good or bad GCHQ is. It fulfils a political function regardless of its tech abilities. Ditto the government - they don't have to be any good, they just have to get elected to be in charge. So we get crap Tories, then crap Labour and next crap Reform. That's how it works.
Re: Yeah, but...
If the cost of Linux replacing MS on the desktop is giving up all the freedom of choice Linux affords, I'd rather Linux sit at 4% market share forever,
outlawing the purchase of Huawei networking kit to build 5G networks
And yet no one seemed too fussed about them being deployed into NHS HSCN networks, and the fact that most DSLAMs had them.