Huawei tries to be a healthy 'sapling' in competition with 'big trees'

Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd, a Shenzhen-based Chinese telecommunication giant, is trying to get more business momentum in the U.S. market by joining hands with local partners.

"By continuously strengthening cooperation with local partners, Huawei is gradually expanding the visibility and credibility in the U.S. market", said Shen Jingyang (Victor Shen), the CEO of Huawei Enterprise USA Inc.

As one of the world's leading manufacturers of telecommunications equipment, Huawei has been successful in Europe, India, Japan, and emerging markets generally. Its commercial LTE solutions have been deployed in more than 100 capital cities and nine financial centers worldwide, according to Shen.

However, Huawei's business in the U.S. has been hampered by " security concerns" by the U.S. government.

But Huawei does not give up the U.S. market. On the contrary, it adopts a series of new strategies to meet the challenges.

"We considered ourselves as a start-up in the U.S.," Shen said in a recent interview with Xinhua.

"We decided to put our advantage and strength on only 10 percent of the U.S. market," said Shen, after doing a subtraction on their business area and put aside those hard, non-realistic and sensitive ones.

Huawei now is trying to cultivate clients in retail, education, media & entertainment industries and Chinese companies.

The "subtraction principle" helped Huawei focus on certain part of the big market and build closer connections and partnerships with over 100 customers by providing personalized solutions, and delivering a superior user experience.

Sears, one of the U.S. leading retail enterprises, decided to use Huawei's technology and equipment when upgrading hundreds of stores' network. Northern Michigan University, Crowley Independent School District in Texas and Digital Domain, a visual effects and digital production company in Hollywood, accepted storage, internet solutions and other services provided by Huawei.

The U.S. has huge ICT demands, said Shen, representing about 40 percent of the world's annual market and 60 billion dollars market is accessible to Huawei.

In such a well-developed market, Huawei faced tough competition. "Our major local competitors have first-class technology, management experience and tens of thousands of partners," Shen told Xinhua, "we compared them to giant and leafy trees which cloud sunshine needed for plant growing underneath."

In order to make a breakthrough, Huawei sought and valued its local partners and employees.

"We now have a lighthouse project, which is to find lighthouse partners in each area," said Shen. "We'd like to share our market advantage with them and provide them our training and technical support, so as to gain brand and market influence while ensuring healthy, sustainable, and effective growth for both sides."

"The success of our partners like bright lighthouses," said Shen, "They could help Huawei develop an ecosystem in targeting market to attract more partners and clients to cooperate with Huawei."

Shen is confident to lead the company through the difficult situation and to be a healthy "sapling" in the competition with " big trees".