Do not wake up a sleeping tiger. Yes, the United States has scored an own-goal by making China’s Huawei to decouple from America, and in the process restructured and redesigned its business. Before the big sanctions, Huawei depended on many American firms. They made money from Huawei and Huawei used their technologies to make money – call it win-win, the benefits of globalization to a large extent.
Under sanctions, Huawei was forced to return to the basics. And now it is back: “Huawei has formally launched HarmonyOS NEXT, marking a definitive break from the Android ecosystem and representing a significant step in its quest for technological independence from Western platforms. The launch, announced on Wednesday, officially initiates public beta testing for the OS on select Huawei smartphones and tablets powered by the company’s Kirin and Kunpeng chips.” Notice, they have cut-off from Google’s Android and Intel, AMD and Qualcomm chips.
As that happens, Russia’s Putin dropped a line today: “We did not refuse nor fight the dollar, we were forbidden to use it … so we must look for alternatives” as BRICS pursues a US dollar alternative.
Tekedia Mini-MBA edition 16 (Feb 10 – May 3, 2025) opens registrations; register today for early bird discounts.
Tekedia AI in Business Masterclass opens registrations here.
Join Tekedia Capital Syndicate and invest in Africa’s finest startups here.
Sanctions are tools but I am not sure how that is helping the US when you look at how the superpower is using sanctions to motivate its competitors, and inspire them to go and do big things. Of course, you can ask: who is this village boy offering a perspective on how America can use its sanction toolkit? Let me be….I am just a teacher!
Huawei Breaks Completely Free from Android OS with The Formal Launch of HarmonyOS NEXT
---
Register for Tekedia Mini-MBA (Feb 10 - May 3, 2025), and join Prof Ndubuisi Ekekwe and our global faculty; click here.
We are still arguing that the US did something wrong by sanctioning a Chinese company? A typical African perspective. For the Chinese, when pushed to the wall, they fight back, but for Nigerians/Africans? It’s either they sleep on the wall and keep praying, or look for openings in the wall and squeeze themselves inside. So, instead of learning from the Chinese, we will spend plenty time arguing about America being shortsighted or fearing competition. Always learning the wrong lessons.
Give Nigerian company a sanction, the company and its staff will simply relocate to the very country that sanctioned it, just to maintain table manners, because ours is to remain subservient, nothing else. Emirates suspended flights here, and we were all over the place, holding meetings, even announcing fake resumptions. We are that shameless, irresponsible and purposeless.
We are already falling without being under any sanction, what would have happened if there were major sanctions here? It would have been a perfect excuse to turn the entire land into a ghost town. The same people we blame for our underdevelopement and colonization, we are always running after them, wanting to be in their good books, because we cannot exist without them. Shame.