Huawei Gives Employees Mega Bonus For Resisting Trump

Huawei Technologies announced Tuesday on social media that employees will receive bonuses as a thank you for helping it cope with US sanctions and blacklisting by the Trump administration.  

The Huawei announcement said 90,000 employees could receive up to $3,100 each. 

“In 2019, the company and all employees were, and are, facing extraordinarily external challenges,” said an internal email to staff members, first obtained by the Nikkei Asian Review. “Upon approval by the company’s president, a special dedication award will be paid.”

The announcement informed employees that the bonus would be equivalent to their October salary.

More significant bonuses are expected for employees in chip production, research and development, and manufacturing-related jobs. 

Huawei, which is one of the world’s largest 5G equipment and smartphone makers, had to quickly overhaul its product line with domestic chips to reduce reliance on US ones. 

The company has a workforce of roughly 190,000 spread across 170 countries and over $105 billion of annual revenues.

The Trump administration has labeled Huawei a national security threat, accusing it of allowing the Chinese government to use backdoors to spy on customers.

The US crackdown on Huawei via economic war, such as sanctions and blacklisting, has so far cost the company $10 billion in sales this year. 

Huawei founder and CEO Ren Zhengfei recently spoke with The Wall Street Journal about the deteriorating relations with the US and denied the allegations that it spies on its customers or any government. 

Zhengfei said, “we have virtually no business dealings in the US” since the blacklisting.

He said Huawei was a major buyer of US chips before it was blacklisted. Sales figures showed the company bought $11 billion of chips from US suppliers in 2018. The blacklisting forced Huawei to rely on domestic chips. 

Zhengfei said: “We can survive very well without the US. The China-U.S. trade talks are not something I’m concerned with.”

The Trump administration has spent at least 18 months spreading Sinophobia across the world, in the attempt to bankrupt Huawei.