逆火：出口管制帮助华为，伤害美国企业

RODRIGO BALBONTIN|OCTOBER 2025 Huawei is a more innovative company today than it was before the U.S. government sought tochoke its supply chain. This case should serve as a lesson: U.S. techno-economic power isweaker than most think, and sanctions often hurt U.S. competitiveness more than China’s. KEY TAKEAWAYS The first Trump administration tried to limit sales of Huawei’s telecom equipment inAmerica and other nations due to cybersecurity concerns. The administration laterimposed export controls on Huawei in an attempt to kill it for doing business with Iran. The U.S. government’s rationale for its actions against Huawei is a legacy of an earlier erawhen America had enough power to impose crippling sanctions without harming its owncompanies’ competitiveness. Because of U.S. actions, Huawei developed its own operating system (OS), built its ownchips, and bought equipment from other nations. Despite U.S. actions against Huawei, it remains the world’s largest telecom equipmentmanufacturer, with a 34 percent global market share in 2024, up 2 percentage pointsfrom 2018. Meanwhile, Huawei succeeded in boosting its global market share in telecom equipmentand expanding into new markets, such as smart automotive solutions. Indeed, Huaweiasserts that it has built an ecosystem entirely independent from U.S. technologies. While export controls made Huawei a more robust competitor, they also hurt U.S.technology companies—reducing their sales to Huawei by $33 billion between 2021 and2024—and they triggered retaliation from the Chinese government. It’s time for the U.S. government to rethink the use of export controls on China,recognizing that this is a new era when the effect is just as likely to backfire and hurtAmerican companies and jobs. itif.org CONTENTS Key Takeaways................................................................................................................... 1Introduction....................................................................................................................... 3Huawei 101: Its Businesses and U.S. Actions Against the Company........................................ 4U.S. Government’s Sanctions on Huawei for Alleged Business with Iran ............................... 6U.S. Government’s Attempts to Cripple the Company.......................................................... 7The Effect of Export Controls on Huawei’s Global Market Share ......................................... 10Huawei’s Innovations After the Export Controls ................................................................ 10How Huawei Bounced Back From Export Controls................................................................ 12China’s Mercantilism Allowed Huawei to Survive .............................................................. 12Huawei Had More Than Six Years to Prepare “Spare Tires” to Deal With Export Controls ...... 14Expanding Reliance on the Local Market...................................................................... 14Huawei Overinvested in R&D Capabilities Before Restrictions, and Kept InvestingAfter Them................................................................................................................ 17Huawei Started Working on an Indigenous OS Years Before the Export Controls ............... 20Investing in Semiconductors Was Critical to Continue the Company’s Operations ............. 21Other Short-Term Measures ........................................................................................ 21How Export Controls On Huawei Are Affecting U.S. Companies ............................................. 22Export Controls Cut U.S. Businesses’ Sales by at Least $33 billion .................................... 22Export Controls Triggered the PRC to Retaliate Against U.S. Companies ............................. 25Why This Matters ............................................................................................................. 26Policy Recommendations .................................................................................................. 26Conclusions ..................................................................................................................... 28Endnotes......................................................................................................................... 29 INTRODUCTION Does the United States have the power to kill Chinese companies? And can it do so withoutreducing its own techno-economic power? At least regarding Huawei, the answer to bothquestions is a definite no. Due to cybersecurity concerns, since 2018, the U.S. government has gradually banned the saleof Huawei products for U.S. telecommunications networks and encouraged other nations to dothe same. But that was not enough for U.S. policymakers; they sought to kill the company. In2019, the U.S. government sanctioned Huawei for doing business with adversaries, such as Iran,by taking judicial actions and adding the company