By Juan Pedro Tomás
Huawei reports it was up 3.8 per cent year-over-year in 2020 with China accounting for 65 per cent of revenues
Chinese vendor Huawei reported its sales revenues reached CNY 891.4 billion (US$ 136.7 billion) in 2020, up 3.8 per cent year-on-year while its net profit rose 3.2 per cent to CNY 64.6 billion, the company said in its annual report.
The company said that trade restrictions implemented by the US government had impacted the company’s operations outside China.
In 2019, Huawei had recorded a 5.6 per cent increase in profit and 19.1 per cent rise in revenue.
The company’s revenue in China grew 15 per cent to CNY584.9 billion, but fell in all other regions, down 12.2 per cent to CNY180.8 billion in EMEA; 8.7 per cent to CNY64.4 billion in Asia Pacific; and 24.5 per cent in the Americas to CNY39.6 billion.
China accounted for 65 per cent of Huawei’s overall revenues last year, up compared to 59 per cent the previous year.
The company’s carrier business recorded revenues of CNY302.6 billion, almost flat year-on-year, while the company’s enterprise business saw its revenues expand by 23 per cent to CNY100.3 billion.
Huawei’s consumer business recorded revenues of CNY482.9 billion, up 3.3 per cent year-on-year.
R&D investment stood at US$21.8 billion in 2020, representing 15.9 per cent of overall revenue, and 3,000 staff were added during the year taking its global total to 197,000.
“Over the past year we’ve held strong in the face of adversity,” said Huawei’s rotating chairman, Ken Hu. “We’ve kept innovating to create value for our customers, to help fight the pandemic, and to support both economic recovery and social progress around the world. We also took this opportunity to further enhance our operations, leading to a performance that was largely in line with forecast.”
In May 2019, the US Department of Commerce added Huawei to its Entity List, a decision that effectively banned the company from buying parts and components from U.S. companies without US government approval.
Under the order, Huawei needs a US government license to buy components from US suppliers. At that time, firms including Google, Intel, Qualcomm and Microm had halted shipments due to the restrictions. Huawei relies heavily on computer chips imported from US companies.
The US government included Huawei in the Department of Commerce’s Entity List due to security concerns, as Washington believes that the Chinese government uses Huawei’s equipment for spying purposes.
Huawei’s founder and CEO, Ren Zhengfei, previously said that the company believed that it will be extremely unlikely that the new US administration would lift the current restrictions imposed by former President Donald Trump
“I think it’s very unlikely that the US will remove us from the Entity List. I won’t say it’s impossible, but it’s extremely unlikely. We basically aren’t considering it a possibility,” Ren said,
