Insights into Huawei's recent troubles with Zen Soo

Zen Soo, technology reporter from South China Morning Post (SCMP) and host of Inside China Tech, joins us for a conversation on Huawei’s recent troubles. We begin with Zen’s introduction of her coverage with SCMP, and the interesting story of her podcast. Then Zen dived deep into Huawei’s recent troubles which include the arrest of their CFO, Meng Wanzhou in Canada, and the fallout between China and US on 5G with Huawei in the centre, and its implications to the other Chinese technology companies expanding abroad.

Here are the interesting show notes and links to the discussion (with time-stamps included):

• Zen Soo (@zensoo , LinkedIn, SCMP profile) Technology Reporter, South China Morning Post & Host of “Inside China Tech” podcast. [0:47]
  • How did you start your career? [1:10]
  • What are you are currently covering in the technology domain for South China Morning Post (SCMP)? [1:42]
  • You run a podcast called “Inside China Tech” (iTunes, Spotify), what’s the focus and what are the intended audience? [2:16] 
  • From you career journey, can you share the interesting lessons you have learned with my audience? [3:29]
• Huawei’s recent troubles [4:47]
  • Can you briefly introduce Huawei, the technology company from Shenzhen to my audience? [5:13]
  • How did Huawei went from small-time trader in Shenzhen to world’s biggest telecoms equipment supplier? [7:11]
  • Before we move forward, I like to get an understanding on what 5G is and why is this technology becoming a point of contention between the US and China? [8:33]
  • What has transpired between Huawei and governments around the world since the arrest of Huawei CFO, Meng Wanzhou? [11:11]
  • Ren Zhengfei, the founder of Huawei have since came out with a PR blitz and yet, the narrative of the Western media is still about the alleged cybersecurity risk (which is interesting because David Sanger from NY Times in Terry Gross “Fresh Air” have mentioned that no one has given concrete proof yet on Huawei with their links to the Chinese Communist party, why is the PR blitz from Huawei not working?  [13:15]
  • What will happen to Meng Wanzhou? Will she be released by Canadian government?  [15:24]
  • The US has put a lot of pressure to their allies to abandon Huawei for their 5G build and rollout particularly in the European Union. However, UK has approved it and their cybersecurity chief, Ciaran Martin has rebuffs US on the risk, why has the UK not follow the line taken by Canada, Germany, Australia and New Zealand? [16:16]
  • What are the broader implications for other Chinese technology companies given the pushback against Huawei by US, European Union and other Western nations? [18:36]
• Closing [20:55]
  • Can you recommend a book or movie or podcast or anything which recently made an impact to your work and personal life? [21:05]
    • Zen’s recommendation: John Carreyrou “Bad Blood” 
  • How do my audience find you? [21:49]

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The show is hosted by Bernard Leong (@bernardleong & weibo) and are sponsored by Ideal Workspace (Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn) with their new Altizen Desk (Twitter, Facebook, Medium). Sound credits for the intro music: Taro Iwashiro, “The Beginning” from Red Cliff Soundtrack and this episode is edited by Carol Yin, and co-produced by Carol Yin and Bernard Leong.