The UK government's decision to limit Chinese technology giant Huawei's role in the national 5G network will cost leading British telecom company BT an estimated 500 million pounds ($654 million), CEO Philip Jansen said on Thursday, albeit welcoming the measure
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 30th January, 2020) The UK government's decision to limit Chinese technology giant Huawei's role in the national 5G network will cost leading British telecom company BT an estimated 500 million pounds ($654 million), CEO Philip Jansen said on Thursday, albeit welcoming the measure.
"The security of our network is paramount for BT. We therefore welcome and are supportive of the clarity provided by Government around the use of certain vendors in networks across the UK and agree that the priority should be the security of the UK's communications infrastructure. We are in the process of reviewing the guidance in detail to determine the full impact on our plans and at this time estimate an impact of around �500 million over the next 5 years," Jansen said in a press release.
The UK government announced on Tuesday that Huawei would be allowed to participate in the national 5G network development, but with certain restrictions. Huawei, in particular, will be excluded from all "safety-related" and "safety critical" networks, as well as "sensitive geographic locations," such as nuclear sites and military bases.
In addition, the access of Huawei and other "high risk vendors" to nonsensitive parts of the network will be capped at 35 percent.
The British government explained its decision by the need to prevent China - via its company - from acting "in a way that is harmful to the UK." The move also came after the US' repeated warnings that allowing Huawei to participate in the 5G network's development would put their bilateral intelligence-sharing agreements in jeopardy.
