American Ban on ZTE offers much food for thought & pain together with ZTE

This photo taken on April 19, 2018 shows the ZTE logo on a building in Nanjing in China's eastern Jiangsu province.AFP/Getty Images

 

Ban on ZTE offers much food for thought

The US ban on sales of chips and components to China's telecommunications company ZTE shocked Chinese society. Some Chinese people are furious at US behavior, others think ZTE deserves it, while some advocate Beijing take it as a warning and boost the country's domestic semiconductor industry. Some are more pessimistic and feel China cannot beat the US in a trade war.

The ZTE case can be argued as a show of high-tech hegemony by the US. It is absurd for Washington to pull this maneuver at the eleventh hour simply because ZTE failed to cut bonuses for its 35 employees as promised. The logic works for US society and the West is watching the case for fun. But certain Chinese people are also taking pleasure in it.  This is the reality.

It must be admitted that the US is powerful and it has started to punch China hard. The rise of China has reached a juncture where Beijing has prompted Washington to ponder its status as the world's No.1 and provided a somewhat disjointed West with a reason to strengthen its solidarity. The impulse to contain China's rise is emerging among Western elites. Radical and even risky policies toward China are gaining increasing support.

China needs a strong will, an open mind and the capacity to fight back. Through political solidarity and a robust economy, Beijing should be tough enough to withstand the slings and arrows. China needs to incubate and shape strategic technology research and development.

The reason why chip technology has experienced such limited progress despite years of advocacy is that the Chinese system has not yet formed a key driving force for it.

Beijing must develop its "nuclear weapons" in the field of economics to make the outside world fear strategic confrontation with China.

China should also make friends worldwide, including Western nations, so as to unite all the forces that can be united. It must not overly focus on gains and losses in friction with others. Beijing must protect its interests, but in the meantime it cannot isolate itself doing so.

China needs to accept diverse opinions on the internet, governing them but also adapting to them so as to prevent online opinions from impacting on society's overall judgment and confidence.

It is hoped that China will develop a greater core competitiveness which other countries cannot match. This is an expectation of all Chinese people.

American business to pain together in ZTE case

https://youtu.be/XgbspspyfLQ

The US government sales ban of American components to the ZTE Corporation will surely inflict significant damage to the company. However, the pattern of globalization shows that not only will the US not secure a victory, it will also suffer a harsh blowback. The US stock market came to a similar conclusion, and media from around the world calculated that the US' future losses will be significant.

Qualcomm is a major mobile chip supplier for ZTE mobile phones. According to Reuters, Qualcomm will be harmed during this strike because ZTE is an important client, and its competitors could benefit from ZTE choosing alternative manufacturers. Furthermore, Qualcomm might suffer more setbacks when China retaliates on the US for this ban.

According to studies by various media organizations, the full implementation of the seven-year sales ban on ZTE will amount to combined loss of $6.8 billion for Qualcomm, Acacia Communications, and Oclaro Inc. It will also affect more than 32,000 employees. Due to this estimation, Acacia Communications stocks dropped 35.95 percent this week. Additionally, Intel and Microsoft will be hit by shockwaves in the tech industry.

Over the years, China has grown to become the largest sales market for US electronic chips, providing US companies with substantial funds for research and development. Losing the Chinese market might cause these US companies to decline in quality, which could result in a bleak financial future.US semiconductor companies are facing real threats as they will likely be taken over by their opponents.

The US will also be hurt from increasing suspicions to its business environment. The US government ended ZTE's business dealings with American companies by force, due to "35 employees' bonuses issues" for the company with 80,000 employees. Is the American business environment still trustworthy? Does this not imply that the US government can bully whoever it wishes? Cooperation with American companies is already difficult and being reviewed by the US government for political correctness will not make matters easier.

Some Westerners criticize the risks of doing business with Chinese companies, but not one multinational company has experienced the same mistreatment ZTE has been subjected to. The proper name for ZTE's case could be called "35 people bonus crisis" and if this is what starts the cooperation breakdown between the US and China, or globalization in general, it will be one of the most bizarre jokes in history.

China will hit back in the best way it knows and inflict losses for American companies in China. Washington should not have any delusions of tolerance from China after causing such damage to its businesses.

With China and the US trading blows in this situation, the US economy and trade relations will delve into chaos. Investments of American companies in China far exceed Chinese companies in the US, meaning that the US has more to lose since these investments will not be spared during this fight.

Most importantly, Chinese society will lose faith in cooperation with American high-tech companies. The "35 people bonus crisis" will also serve as a push for China determination to develop its semiconductor industry to replace America's components.

China will endure a sting in the high-tech sector confrontation, but the US will suffer lasting pain. China has been slow to develop its semiconductor technology because it is cheaper to purchase American products in the past. Developing chips and operating systems will require massive market support and China's yearly import of $200 billion can definitely cover the funding for this research.

The consequences of punishing ZTE is now out of Washington's control. The intertwined economies of China and the US are like "conjoined twins" and separation will cause major pain for both sides. Washington's thinking that this is a unilateral punishment is naïve, and this short-sighted judgement will be paid at the expense of American companies and enterprises. - - Global Times


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China to open wider: How will US react?

If Washington thinks China's upgrade of its opening-up was triggered by US menaces, it is making a historic mistake in its relationship with Beijing. Whether the Sino-US trade war is aggravated depends on Washington. It is hoped US actions accord with Trump's pleasant tweets rather than more old carrot-and-stick

Opening-up China's future growth path

The community with shared future for mankind is a goal of China to lead the world forward into the future. The Belt and Road initiative is one of the paths toward it. The world has never seen a major power emerging with a peaceful and cooperative manner. Some people say that China is only pretending to rise peacefully. After Beijing's new measures were announced at Tuesday's forum, the world should have gained a better understanding of China.

Trump's car tariff tweet distorts truth

With the development of China's economic growth and strength of science and technology, further opening-up and lowering of tariffs will be the future trend. But how China will do this will be decided based on WTO rules and China's own interests. This is China's sovereignty. Beijing will never listen to the command of Washington.

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Enter Android in the smartphone operating system titans

In the clash of the smartphone operating system titans, we take a look at what Google has brought to the table.

BRINGING IT: A Google Android figurine sits on a welcome desk at the new Google office in Toronto. - Reuters

 

FANCY having a Donut, Eclair, Froyo, Gingerbread, Honeycomb, Ice Cream Sandwich, or Jellybean?

While the list above seems like a mouth-watering spread of sinful desserts, it can refer to something else in the technological world today.

For the uninitiated, those are also the names of the different update versions of the Android smartphone operating system (OS).

Before we touch on the topic of Android, let's first start with smartphones and how they have become an integral part of our lives in this day and age.

It wasn't too long ago when the sheer mention of the word 'smartphone' brought to mind an image of a busy businessman holding a personal digital assistant (PDA) phone to check and send work e-mail messages on the fly.

Aside from businessmen and those with deep pockets, it was uncommon to see an average consumer owning a smartphone. Among my peers during my time as a student, anyone who owned a smartphone was deemed to be a rich spoilt brat.

Fast forward to today, the advancements of technology has made it so much easier to own a smartphone.

What is a smartphone? By Oxford dictionary's definition, a smartphone is a mobile phone that is able to perform many of the functions of a computer, typically having a relatively large screen and an operating system capable of running general-purpose applications.

The early smartphones came into existence in the 1990s, although the early incarnations of smartphones were basically mobile phones incorporating PDA (personal digital assistant) features, and not necessarily with large screens.

Throughout the years, there have been various operating systems supporting the vast multitude of smartphones that have reached the hands of consumers. Among the operating systems that we have come to know and love are Symbian, Palm OS, Windows Phone, BlackBerry, Android and iOS.

As the title suggests, this column will be all about Google's Android operating system.

Meteoric rise

The first ever smartphone sold running on the Android operating system was the HTC Dream, which was released in 2008.

Since then, Android has come a long way, climbing up the ranks and capturing the biggest share of the pie in the smartphone operating system market. Aside from smartphones, the operating system is also widely used on tablet computers.

With a whole plethora of Android devices being unleashed into the market, the operating system from Google overtook long-time leaders Symbian at the end of 2010 to be the world's most widely used smartphone operating system, according to online sources.

It is growing at an estimated 1.5 million activations per day. This means that everyday, 1.5 million Android devices are powered on by consumers for the first time. Android leads the smartphone OS world, with a market share of 75% during the third quarter of 2012.

Being a product of Google, Android smartphones come readily available with a staple of Google applications (apps), such as Gmail, Google Maps, Google Calendar, Google+ and Google Chrome browser.

Interestingly, every update version of the operating system is named after a form of dessert, and in alphabetical order. The first system version was named Donut (1.6), followed by Eclair (2.0 - 2.1), Froyo (2.2), Gingerbread (2.3), Honeycomb (3.1 - 3.2), Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0), and Jellybean (4.1 - 4.2).

Unlike the other main operating systems in the smartphone market, Google has made its Linux-based OS open source. This means that the software can be freely distributed and modified by device manufacturers, wireless carriers and developers.

This move has successfully attracted a large community of app developers, as can be proven by the whopping 800,000 apps available for download on the Google Play store as of January.

In October 2012, the Google Play store celebrated a milestone of 25 billion app downloads.

Tailor made

Android has become a favourite choice for manufacturers as it is easy to adopt and implement, rather than having to develop a whole new operating system from scratch. We can find this operating system from Google being adopted by a diverse range of manufacturers, ranging from big brand names such as Samsung, HTC, Motorola, Sony Ericsson and LG to smaller, upstart Chinese companies.

However, not every Android smartphone provides the same experience. Different hardware manufacturers have different "skins" or add-ons, above the base Android software, to differentiate themselves from the rest of the pack. Samsung's Touchwiz user interface and HTC's Sense user interface are examples of the types of "flavoured" Android offerings by other manufacturers.

Google also collaborates with different hardware manufacturers to release their flagship Android smartphones under the Google Nexus line. The Nexus phones provide the original "vanilla" Android experience for users and are the first to receive the latest Android version updates.

Because of this diversity, we can find Android smartphones for every segment of the market. Aside from the pricier high-end smartphones, there is also a wide selection of mid- to low-end Android smartphones which are more affordable, hence making it easier for more consumers to own a smartphone.

Android has been so popular that we are seeing it in more and more electronic products and not just smartphones or tablets. There are even manufacturers who are starting to incorporate Android into their microwave ovens!

Among the advantages of the Android operating system are its ability to multitask, the huge amount of options for devices, the notification bar, homescreen widgets, and the connectivity to the Google brand. The advantages and disadvantages of the operating system will be delved into in future editions of this weekly column which will appear on TechCentral.my.

This weekly column will be a medium to share about everything Android. Expect to read about news on the operating system updates, app reviews or the new devices running on Google's operating system. Stay tuned!

(Donovan is a full-time auditor and big-time gadget lover who discovered the wonders of the Android world after a chance encounter with Samsung's Galaxy S back in October 2010.)
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Chinese smartphone innovators shrug off Android dominance.

Chinese smartphone innovators shrug off Android dominance

Local firms elbowing in on smartphone market

In China's booming smartphone market, which overtook the United States as the world's largest last year, a host of domestic firms have innovation on the brain, especially as the industry is on pace for even greater growth.

Within minutes of going on sale online, Xiaomi Technology sold 2.5 million units of its M12 smartphone, which has specifications that, some say, exceed that of the iPhone and retails for less than half the price on the Chinese mainland.

Lei Jun, CEO of Xiaomi Technology Co., forecast that the company's sales would double this year. In 2012, the turnover of the company founded less than three years ago amounted to 12 billion yuan (1.93 billion U.S. dollars).

Chinese smartphone firms believe that long-term efforts in innovation are required in developing home-grown operating systems and are not concerned by the dominance of Android.

A report published by the China Academy of Telecommunication Research warned that Chinese companies may face commercial discrimination because the Android operation system -- what is deemed as a "core" technology -- is strictly controlled by Google.

The report, released on March 1, urged China's smartphone makers to develop self-innovated systems as the country lacks its own big name, with Android's supremacy in 97.7 percent of domestic smartphones.

Android's dominance is the market's choice, and its popularity is worldwide.By the end of 2012 in China, Google's Android took up 86.4 percent in the market and Apple's iOS 8.6 percent. Home-made systems account for less than one percent, statistics suggested.

Many industry insiders, like Lei, have faith in China's mobile phone market. Big names like Huawei, ZTE and Lenovo have elbowed their way in, hoping to grab a piece of the market.

Statistics from IDC, an IT company and market researcher, show that China's smartphone market could grow by as much as 44 percent this year, with total smartphone shipments approaching 300 million units.

A total of 67.21 million smartphones were sold in China in the fourth quarter of 2012, up 236.4 percent year on year, with domestic brands contributing to 77.9 percent of total sales, according to statistics from the China Academy of Telecommunication Research.

"Domestic makers made great strides in the smartphone market for their abundant manufacturing experience and the cheap prices favored by those using a smartphone for the first time," the report said.

Lenovo, a leading PC firm, emerged as the second-biggest smartphone seller, with 13.2 percent of China's market share last year, following the Republic of Korea's Samsung Electronics, which took a 17.7 percent.

Apple came in third, with 11 percent, and domestic companies Huawei Technologies Co. and Coolpad rounded out the top five, with 9.9 and 9.7 percent of the market share, respectively.

Yang Yuanqing, chairman of the board of Lenovo Group, said the company started developing smartphones and tablet PCs to compete with Apple in both domestic and overseas markets.

The company's star product, the Lephone, is a low-cost smartphone that industry insiders have hailed as a challenge to Apple's iPhone.

At the Mobile World Congress in January in Barcelona, there were plenty of Chinese domestic devices on show, ranging from those costing less than 1,650 yuan to high-end products valued at more than 3,000 yuan.

"We are providing products that cater to each level, from beginners to high-end consumers," Yang explained.

Lenovo's flagship product, the 3,299-yuan K800, boasts a 1.6 GHz Intel processor and a 4.5-inch screen. But it is still based on Android, an open-sourced, Linux-based operating system controlled by Google.

A report issued on March 1 by the China Academy of Telecommunication Research warned that Chinese smartphone makers may face commercial discrimination, as most domestic smartphones are over-dependent on the Android system.

Lenovo's Yang said Sunday that creating an operating system is not as difficult as providing an active platform on which people are encouraged to develop software.

"Developing a system that only offers tedious software development is useless," Yang said.

Yang, who is also a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), said, "I am saying it is not impossible to develop a home-made operating system, as the future market is promising with China's homemade brands expanding their global influence."

Behind concerns about companies' over-reliance on the Android system, among others, is a lack of innovation -- the soft spot that has become apparent despite the country's neck-breaking development over the past three decades.

But innovation is not restricted to an operating system, according to Lei Jun, the Xiaomi CEO and a member of the CPPCC National Committee, who says the ways his company develops and markets its products are also innovative.

"Innovations we made included differentiated functionalities in response to various consumers' needs. This sort of innovation is not ground-breaking, but at least it is a breakthrough," said Lei.

Yu Wenqing, an industry insider with China Mobile Research Institute, gives these companies credit for putting a twist on existing technology.

"There were so called micro-innovations in those brands," Yu said, adding that China has to move step by step, as fundamental changes require great time and investment.

Chris Evdemon, a manager with Innovation Works, which invests in seed-stage companies to encourage innovation, called the "micro-innovations" a steppingstone for fundamental innovation.

These initiatives may inject fresh energy to the larger-scale, enterprise-driven innovation that the government is expecting. China has adopted a strategy of building itself up through the development of science and education and boosting the country's core ability to sustain innovation-driven development.

"Everyone has his own dream to pursue," Yang Yuanqing said.

Yang's dream includes seeing all Chinese people living well-off lives and enjoying dignity on the world stage.

"Also, Chinese enterprises will embrace worldwide recognition, not only for scale or sales, but for their capacities for innovation," he added. - Xinhua