Huawei loses key 5G network customer to Nokia and Ericsson in Japan

The blacklisting of Huawei by the U.S has caused the Chinese company to lose a key 5G network customer in Japan. 

SoftBank Group's Japanese telco unit has selected Nokia as a strategic partner for its 5G roll-out and Ericsson as a supplier of radio access network equipment. Despite taking part in earlier 5G trials, Huawei and ZTE, which are 4G vendors for SoftBank, were not selected. Japanese media outlets reported that NTT Docomo and KDDI could follow suit and not select Huawei as their 5G partners. 

“You can also expect Docomo and KDDI to follow suit,’’ said Masahiko Ishino, an analyst at Tokai Tokyo Research Centre. “So SoftBank isn’t going to be at a cost disadvantage.’’

Other countries such as Australia, New Zealand and Britain have stated that they will not use  network equipment from Huawei due to national security concerns.

For Singapore's 5G network roll-out, IMDA states that it "encourages vendor diversity" in the local telecommunication systems "to mitigate risks from dependency on any one vendor" and "operators should ensure that the performance and reliability of equipment purchased from vendors meet their commercial operational needs and regulatory requirements, including those pertaining to quality of service, resilience and security."

Source: South China Morning Post