How does the US banning Huawei affect Microsoft's plans to sell Azure around the world?

[BajanSaint69]

This week we've seen an international company effectively cut off from access to most if not all American tech as part of a trade dispute.

How will this affect the willingness of foreign governments and companies to place critical infrastructure and information on cloud platforms built by US based companies such as MS, Google and Amazon?

Will this lead non US companies to support the growth of a third OS that is operated by someone based outside of the US?

 

[Drael646464]

Huawei seems to be planning to release another OS with Android and webapp capabilities. Talks currently with aptoide (not US based). I suspect this will open the door for non-google android (Amazon is already doing that, but as more join, more devs will).

So I do think it might create a 'third option' on mobile, but rather than an OS, simply Android without google, and perhaps PWA (which lets face it, would be a wise dev investment in an uncertain market)

I also don't think this is just about a trade war. To me, that's sort of a pretext. China doesn't like having US tech, US doesn't like having Chinese tech, Russia doesn't like having US tech, etc. China right now is all amount making moves to reduce US components and has long banned Google for similar reasons. Russia made a deal awhile back with sailfish for similar reasons.

Really, the US is late to the game, of this mutually, and the realistically paranoid tech war about national infrastructure and informational security.

There are programs embedded in CPUs for example, that could be used as foreign govt backdoors to leak information. Similarly, foreign hardware could be designed with kill switches to use to shut down essential infrastructure in a war. China and Russia have both focused development and planning along lines of infrastructure, sabotage attacks, in case of a war with America. And nobody wants their secrets leaked.

Foreign tech, belonging to other superpowers is a security liability. Obviously the US lacks the resources to homebake all it's hardware, and China lacks any viable operating systems for international business. Russia has even less options. So it's an uneasy situation, and IMO this is a manifestation of that, as much as any trade war.

Should tariffs and so on calm down, I fully expect bans to continue on certain key infrastructure both in the US and in China. I also expect companies like Microsoft will have to give China meaningful assurances and places like Taiwan etc, will likely pick up a lot of the hardware slack.

 

[T Moore]

This has nothing to do with trade disputes. All about 23 counts pertaining to the alleged theft of intellectual property, obstruction of justice and fraud related to its alleged evasion of US sanctions against Iran.
Their network hardware was banned from the US in 2012

 

[BajanSaint69]

Given that Huawei was the world leader in 5G infrastructure, and MS is heavily focused on 5G don't you see any global fall out there?

 

[Drael646464]

Given that Huawei was the world leader in 5G infrastructure, and MS is heavily focused on 5G don't you see any global fall out there?

In the US sure. It's certainly set back internet advance in the states.

Outside the US, I imagine Huawei will continue providing 5G infrastructure, and everyone will keep using it. The ban is on direct trade between US companies and Huawei. A third party can buy Huaweis stuff, and trade with US companies (like a network provider using Huaweis tech). Even then, to actually use the infrastructure, MSFT isn't making a purchase, the consumer is.

The reason why Google had to ditch ties, is because they charge for google licenses for android devices. That's a direct sale to Huawei.

 

[Ryujingt3]

Most likely everyone else will follow the US and not deal with Huawei either.

 

[BajanSaint69]

Not as likely as you think, the UK is already saying it won't comply with the US directive once certain safeguards are made, and the rest of us outside the US mostly figure that most networking equipment has backdoors in it for the NSA anyway so it's little difference to us if there's a backdoor to another country.

 

[Drael646464]

Not as likely as you think, the UK is already saying it won't comply with the US directive once certain safeguards are made, and the rest of us outside the US mostly figure that most networking equipment has backdoors in it for the NSA anyway so it's little difference to us if there's a backdoor to another country.

The US has been trying to pressure Europe to dump them for a while now (months), and a lot of European countries have just openly refused. I sincerely don't think any other country is going to jump on board.

The superpowers have more risk when it comes to infrastructure and privacy (direct warfare doesn't work reliably enough and they are in the dominant positions), and they also have the luxury of being able to homebake some stuff (potentially). Everyone else has to depend on the global market, and don't have to worry as much about that.

Like if China wanted to take, say australia, they'd just do it. They face backlash, and retaliation from the international community sure, but they wouldn't need hacking, infrastructure attacks, intel etc. They could just brute force it. And so it's not as big a concern for anybody else.

Infrastructure is a superpowers vulnerability point (which is also why this is a cold tech war, not a trade war; the pretext is trade, but the reality is China and the US govts are afraid of each other militarily, as Russia and the US were during their cold war).

The US is also limited in it's ability to cut off ties. So is China. They can't make everything. They can ban Huawei or apple, but if they start banning anybody that trades with them, they'll quickly find their economy in a mess.

I'm sure it'll effect everyone else, but unless some crazy trade deal is offered, with large benefits, I don't see anyone else joining in. Especially because Huawei is a leader in 5G (and dominant in certain markets phone wise)

 

[Ryujingt3]

No doubt they will both reach an 'amicable agreement' soon enough. Sure, China and US may have their spats, but they need each other.

 

[Drael646464]

No doubt they will both reach an 'amicable agreement' soon enough. Sure, China and US may have their spats, but they need each other.

If they do they'll be compromising their national security. Honestly, it's completely sane minded to keep your biggest competitor for 'king of the world' status out of your infrastructure. China has had it's Google ban for ages.

Banning the phones for ordinary citizens? Yeah, that might be a bit far. But at least forbidding their tech from all central govt and core infrastructure; that makes perfect sense to me. Power stations, water management, communications networks etc. Access to that stuff can be a weapon, with nothing more than a blackbox chipset feature. Even if it's not used as a weapon, it's like, don't give your competition weapons.

They do totally need each other for trade. So, sanity, willing they'll ease up a bit, and stop effecting things like consumer phones or tariff wars. But the other stuff, IDK, I think that's just smart. The US and China should both be operating from a perspective of suspicion when it comes to vital infrastructure. You don't invest THAT much in the military only to leave a 'backdoor open' to strife in your home turf that reduces it's useability.

 

[Ryujingt3]

If they do they'll be compromising their national security. Honestly, it's completely sane minded to keep your biggest competitor for 'king of the world' status out of your infrastructure. China has had it's Google ban for ages.

Banning the phones for ordinary citizens? Yeah, that might be a bit far. But at least forbidding their tech from all central govt and core infrastructure; that makes perfect sense to me. Power stations, water management, communications networks etc. Access to that stuff can be a weapon, with nothing more than a blackbox chipset feature. Even if it's not used as a weapon, it's like, don't give your competition weapons.

They do totally need each other for trade. So, sanity, willing they'll ease up a bit, and stop effecting things like consumer phones or tariff wars. But the other stuff, IDK, I think that's just smart. The US and China should both be operating from a perspective of suspicion when it comes to vital infrastructure. You don't invest THAT much in the military only to leave a 'backdoor open' to strife in your home turf that reduces it's useability.

Apparently Huawei plans to use Ark OS on their phones, starting next month. So maybe there can be more room in the Android marketplace for more than just Google?

 

[Drael646464]

That's my hope. Does ArkOS run android apps native, or do you think they'll need an emulation layer or something?

 

[Ryujingt3]

That's my hope. Does ArkOS run android apps native, or do you think they'll need an emulation layer or something?

I have no idea. It would be best though if it ran them natively.

I did find this though:

https://www.slashgear.com/hongmeng-os-huaweis-android-replacement-what-we-know-so-far-29578318/

 

[Drael646464]

I have no idea. It would be best though if it ran them natively.

I did find this though:

https://www.slashgear.com/hongmeng-os-huaweis-android-replacement-what-we-know-so-far-29578318/

That's very interesting. If that's a standard weather app running on it, then it would probably make a call to google maps api to get a location. If that's the case, it's possible they have gone down the route of spoofing, ala MicroG (perhaps here, via open street maps or their own proprietary maps system), and their OS will be fully capable of running 95% of android apps.

Good find, in terms of the details. Looks a lot like android. I suspect it's an Android fork, rather than it's own kernel.

 

[Ryujingt3]

That's very interesting. If that's a standard weather app running on it, then it would probably make a call to google maps api to get a location. If that's the case, it's possible they have gone down the route of spoofing, ala MicroG (perhaps here, via open street maps or their own proprietary maps system), and their OS will be fully capable of running 95% of android apps.

Good find, in terms of the details. Looks a lot like android. I suspect it's an Android fork, rather than it's own kernel.

I'm just hoping it manages to give Google a run for their money and inspires other Android manufacturers to follow suit and break away from Google.