Huawei trolls the US by talking up Canadian 5G ambitions

Huawei has issued a press release talking up its great relationship with US neighbor and close ally Canada, especially when it comes to 5G.

The announcement was headlined: ‘Huawei doubles-down on Canadian investment and partnership with three major commitments’. The first is more of a commercial objective as Huawei said it will be launching a 5G smartphone in Canada before the end of the year. It also has the distinct added benefit of justifying statements like ‘Huawei brings 5G to Canada’, which is sure to antagonize the US.

The other two commitments were some kind of partner training programme that will train 1,000 Canadians in ICT and a donation of $100,000 towards Ottowa flood relief. The Ottowa river is inclined to burst its banks periodically and Huawei employs quite a few people there, so it’s also letting them take paid time off to help out when this happens.

“We are incredibly proud and humbled by the work we have accomplished in Canada over the last 10 years,” said Eric Li, President of Huawei Canada. “With a team of over 1,100 employees from coast to coast – 600 of whom are engineers – we have the best and the brightest Canadian minds and we will continue to invest in training for the Canadian marketplace. Canada is the home of Huawei 5G and we are working to ensure we remain at the forefront of 5G technology and development.”

That last sentence reads like blatant trolling to us. The US had repeatedly made it clear to its allies that thoroughly disapproves of any Huawei 5G presence in any of their networks so it would presumably feel highly triggered by this sort of thing. Huawei also issued statements by other execs talking about Canada, 5G and security as it’s divide-and-conquer counter-strategy shows no signs of relenting.