Huawei Hunting for Good Will in Canada Tie-Up 华为在美成立研发中心

By newsdoug on June 15, 2011

Huawei takes cloud approach to US You certainly have to give Huawei Technologies credit for taking a long-term approach to cracking the difficult but lucrative US market. After being rejected twice in previous US initiatives, one to buy former rival and joint venture partner 3Com and another to buy a small firm called 3Leaf (previous post), Huawei seems to be taking a softer, friendlier approach to try and convince wary US politicians it’s not just an arm of the Chinese government. In its latest move on the softer side, Huawei has just announced it is setting up a cloud computing R&D center in the Canadian capital with Carleton University and Canadian telecoms products maker Telus (Toronto: T). (company announcement) Investment in the center isn’t huge, at just $1.4 million, but it does look quite strategic, bringing Huawei together with a prominent Canadian university and a fairly large Canadian firm in the hot area of cloud computing. I’m sure Huawei, now the world’s second biggest seller of mobile telecoms equipment, thought long and hard about this move, and wouldn’t be surprised if expensive consultants played a major part in crafting the final announcement. Of course, a single initiative like this won’t suddenly win over conservative US politicians, but clearly this kind of move will soften Huawei’s image in the eyes of some and could thus make it less of an easy target for US China bashers. I’ve previously predicted that Huawei and/or crosstown rival ZTE (HKEx: 763; Shenzhen: 000063) will score their first major North American deal in the 12 months, and with moves like this I still see such a deal occurring.

Bottom line: Huawei’s opening of a Canadian R&D center with a local university is its latest bid to forge a friendlier global image, and should help it win its first big North American deal in the next 12 months.

我们应当赞扬华为以长期策略打入艰难但诱人的美国市场的努力。华为此前在美国竞购前对手及合作夥伴3Com和小型公司3Leaf都以失败告终，现在似乎正采取更温和友好的方式，试图让警觉的美国政客相信，它并不仅仅是属於中国政府的一家企业。华为近期宣布，它将与卡尔顿学院和加拿大电信产品制造商研科（Telus）<T.TO>联手，在加拿大首都成立云计算研发中心。虽然对该中心的投资仅有140万美元，但这看来颇像一个战略之举，因它促使华为与加拿大一个知名学府与加拿大一家大公司在云计算这一热门领域展开合作。我相信，世界第二大移动通信设备制造商华为对此举进行了长期而艰巨的准备，而如果它聘用大牌咨询顾问参与了决策过程，我不会惊讶。当然，单单这样一个举措不会说服美国保守派政客，但此类举措显然会改善一些人心目中华为的形象，或能在一定程度上避免华为沦为美国反华派的攻击目标。我先前就预计，华为和/或中兴通讯<000063.SZ><0763.HK>一年内将在北美完成首项重大交易，最新进展似乎证明了我的预测。

一句话：华为与加拿大当地学府联手成立研发中心，是打造其全球友好形象的最新举措，应有助於华为未来一年内在北美完成首个大型交易。