United States amends Huawei ban

The United States Department of Commerce has amended the Huawei ban. They amended the tough ban to work on the development of 5g standards. The move is not termed as softening of the government’s stance toward the embattled hardware maker.

The amendment is an attempt to work with the company for the development of the 5G standards, which has been one of the primary forces in its development. The department says, “This action is meant to ensure Huawei’s placement on the Entity List in May 2019 does not prevent American companies from contributing to important standards-developing activities despite Huawei’s pervasive participation in standards-development organizations.”

The change in the ban is to allow U.S. and Huawei to work out the parameters for the next-generation wireless technology. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said in a statement, “The United States will not cede leadership in global innovation. This action recognizes the importance of harnessing American ingenuity to advance and protect our economic and national security.”

He added, “The Department is committed to protecting U.S. national security and foreign policy interests by encouraging U.S. industry to fully engage and advocate for U.S. technologies to become international standards.” Companies are allowed to share information about technologies in order to develop a joint standard without requiring an export license under the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) rule.

The DOC has no plans to ease up on Huawei beyond this development. They placed the tech giants on its entities list last year. According to the U.S., Huawei was placed in the blacklist over an array of ongoing complaints, including ties to the national government, concerns over spying, and alleged sanction violations with Iran.