Despite the American embargo imposed in 2019 and declining smartphone sales, Huawei has not said its last word. Thanks to electric cars and by signing a partnership with the Volkswagen group, the manufacturer could return to center stage.
Whether Huawei got banned by the US just 4 years ago, the Chinese brand has not been idle since then. It continues to produce excellent smartphones, such as the P60 Pro which we recently tested and which was voted the best camera phone of the moment by DXOMark. But whether in Europe or China, the manufacturer has lost its luster, since Huawei has dropped out of the top 5 best sellers of smartphones in its own country.
Despite the diversification of its activities (Huawei also produces laptops, headphones, connected watches, screens, etc.), the manufacturer seems to be struggling to raise the bar. Good news for fans of the brand: it may well be that Huawei has found a way to restore its image thanks to connected cars.
Huawei and Volkswagen hand in hand?
Huawei entering the electric car market? The information is not new. On the other hand, what we knew less was that the manufacturer would have found a powerful ally in the automotive world: volkswagen. This alliance dates back to July 2018 (before the embargo imposed by the USA, therefore). At that time, Huawei and the Audi brand, which belongs to the Volkswagen group, would have signed an agreement to jointly develop electric and autonomous vehicles. In 2021, the two are said to have planned to jointly create a dedicated company, a hypothesis confirmed by Feng Sihan, CEO of Volkswagen in China. However, according to him, nothing has been approved, in particular concerning “the creation of a company between the two entities”.
But according to the Financial Times, there is still talk of a rapprochement between the two giants. Meetings between Volkswagen and Huawei are still happening, with each of the two companies needing each other to establish a foothold in China. There, the German manufacturer is still struggling to establish itself on the electric market against Tesla and BYD. By partnering with a local player like Huawei, which masters the software part and would also integrate its own chipsets into electric cars, Volkswagen would have enough to compete with its main competitors. As for Huawei, it could be a great way to get into a whole new market, taking advantage of the expertise of an automotive pundit.
Will we soon see Volkswagen cars equipped with HarmonyOS, the cross-platform operating system developed by Huawei? It’s still a little early to tell, but the founder of Sino Auto Insights, a consultancy in Beijing, said it would allow the Chinese giant to “legitimize its technology and its brand” in the automotive market.
Source: Financial Times