In a move that’s going to deal a major blow to Huawei’s smartphone business, Google has suspended all its business activities with the Chinese smartphone giant. The move comes due to the U.S. government’s Commerce Department putting Huawei and 68 other affiliate Chinese companies on the Entity List following an executive order from the U.S. President Donald Trump. The Entity List is like a blacklist of sorts that prevents all U.S. tech companies from dealing with Chinese companies. The report from Reuters says that due to the ban, Google has suspended its business with Huawei which includes losing access to Google Apps, OS updates and security updates. While existing Huawei smartphones will continue to work without any issues and download apps from Google Play, they will not receive any OS or security updates until this issue is resolved. This means all existing Huawei smartphones out there will no longer be receiving any OS or security updates. A Google spokesperson has confirmed that they are complying with the government order and reviewing the implications of this move.
— Android (@Android) May 20, 2019 Huawei is the world’s second largest smartphone manufacturer. This move is going to have a massive blow to its international smartphone business. In China, Huawei does not sell its smartphones with Google Play suite of apps and services so the ban is not going to have that big of an impact in its home market. Nonetheless, this is an issue that needs to be resolved on an immediate basis as it otherwise puts Huawei’s entire smartphone business in jeopardy. Huawei will continue to have access to the AOSP version of Android but for international markets, its smartphones also need access to the Google Play Suite. The U.S. government is considering limiting the restrictions it has put on Huawei to ensure its existing business is not affected negatively but it is yet to take a final decision in this regard.
