Chinese tech giant Huawei is secretly funding research in America despite being blacklisted. . The most advanced research is done at universities including Harvard, and the money is spent through an independent research foundation based in Washington and a competition for scientists.
Bloomberg It found that Huawei has been the sole funder of the research competition since 2022, which has awarded millions of dollars in prizes and attracted hundreds of proposals from scientists. Some of these scientists are at top US universities that prohibit researchers from working with the company.
What’s the big deal? According to Kevin Wolf, a partner at the Akin law firm specializing in export controls, there are fears that the study could lead to innovations in both defense contracts and commercial interests in China. Behind it all is Optica, posted online he is interested in “highly sensitive optical sensors and detectors” among other research categories.
“It’s a bad look for a prestigious research foundation to anonymously accept money from a Chinese company, and it raises a lot of national security concerns for the U.S. government,” said co-author James Mulvenon, a defense contractor who works on research security issues. several books on industrial espionage.
It should be noted that this money transfer operation does not appear to be illegal, since research intended for publication does not fall within the scope of the ban. Huawei is clearly running similar races in other parts of the world, though. People who took part in the research competition in the US did not even know that Huawei was involved, believing that the money would come from Optica. The contest awards $1 million a year, and Optica has given no indication that Huawei is providing the cash.
The spokesperson of Huawei said this Bloomberg said that the company and the Optica Foundation created the competition to support global research and promote academic communication, and that it did not appear to be some kind of promotion, and remained anonymous. Optica CEO Liz Rogan said in a statement that many fund donors “prefer to remain anonymous” and that “there is nothing unusual about this practice.” He also said the entire board was aware of Huawei’s involvement and that everyone had signed off on it. Bloomberg noted that the Huawei-backed contest is the only one on Optica’s website that does not list individual and corporate financial sponsors.
Huawei has been caught in a web of US restrictions for the past few years. , as the company is effectively banned. It all started in 2019 with President Trump the This posed “unacceptable” risks to national security. At that time, Trump said that “foreign enemies” this would eventually lead to “potentially catastrophic effects”. Wait, Trump has “potentially catastrophic effects?” he used his words. Wild.
For this purpose, the company has faced numerous lawsuits there is no evidence of actual theft, and although the company denies the accusations, it is for the purpose of data theft. Huawei is also accused influence the investigation and the documents appear to show .
Some expected President Biden to rescind Trump’s executive order , but it went in the opposite direction. Not only is the order, but Biden is in effect from obtaining an FCC license and that In China’s high-tech industries. We won’t be dealing with China any time soon, so Huawei will continue to be persona non grata on this side of the pond (the company is still growing rapidly in Europe.)
