Government decisions will have no impact on 5G rollouts except to end the uncertainty
Reports that the UK government will allow Huawei to supply operators with kit for the radio element of 5G networks but not the core have been greeted with the usual hyperbole that has surrounded recent conversations about the Chinese mobile giant.
Depending on who you read this morning, the Prime Minister has either “banned” Huawei from 5G core networks or given the “green light” for the company to participate in the rollout of next generation networks.
The final decision won’t be confirmed until the Department for Culture, Media and Sport’s (DCMS) long-awaited report into the UK’s communications infrastructure is published – either later this month or in May.
But if these latest reports are correct, the truth is that nothing has really changed for mobile operators except that a huge source of uncertainty will have been eliminated.
The calls for Huawei to be banned from the UK’s 5G networks have largely been sparked by the US government’s long-held suspicions about the company and because 5G will support a new breed of mission-critical business applications.
This means 5G networks will carry unprecedented volumes of sensitive data and that any suspension to connectivity would be crippling.
Huawei has been excluded from the US’s telecoms infrastructure on national security fears, largely founded on the firm’s perceived links to the Chinese government and a belief that legislation requires firms in China to assist in state surveillance.
