U.S. firms reportedly struggling to replace Huawei network equipment

U.S. firms haven’t made much progress in moving away from Huawei network equipment. That implies a new report by the FCC. Despite huge funding, only a few companies completely removed China-made network equipment from their cores.

On July 01, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) released the fourth report on the ‘Rip and Replace’ program. The analysis shows that only 12% of the U.S. firms in this program managed to remove Huawei equipment from their network.

FCC notes that out of 126 U.S. companies, only 14 applicants have completed their work. After appropriate funding, they managed to replace Huawei or China-made equipment with alternatives present in the foreign market.

Other companies are constantly requesting to extend the deadline for completion of the respective project. For instance, NfinityLink asked for a six-month extension to finish the ‘Rip and Replace’ work and bring in the Nokia network equipment.

NfinityLink also cites that it is looking for reliable alternatives that can help the company comply with the program. But doing so will require more effort and time, without full funding.

According to these firms, the reason for not completing the work on time is a lack of funds. The FCC report mentioned that:

“Nearly 40% of recipients have notified the Commission through their statutorily required status updates that they cannot complete the work required under the ‘Rip and Replace’ program without full government funding.”

U.S. firms seems to be struggling to replace Huawei network equipment (Image Credits: Huawei)

It seems the U.S. companies haven’t progressed much in removing Huawei network equipment from their cores. They continue to face problems in finding more efficient network equipment as well as funds-related issues to remove the existing equipment.

Huawei has been facing the ‘Rip and Replace’ challenge since 2019 when the U.S. sanctioned the company for security risks. At that time, the Secure and Reliable Communications Network Act provided $1.9 billion for U.S. telecoms to remove Huawei and ZTE equipment. But that appears to be 40% of the total amount required in this work.

The Chairwoman of the FCC – Jessica Rosenworcel requested another $3 billion from the U.S. government. Despite two times of appeals, the authorities didn’t respond to this subject. Read More…

FCC believes that the number of companies will increase by the time it submits the next report on the Rip and Replace program. However, the current scenario is saying otherwise!

[Source – FCC/Via – LightReading]