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Cellphones United Kingdom

British Consumers Have Started To Dump Huawei Phones (latimes.com) 142

"British consumers have begun trading in smartphones from Huawei Technologies Co. in growing numbers since the Chinese tech giant was hit by a U.S. supply blacklist," reports Bloomberg: Trade-in and price-tracking companies report a surge in U.K. consumers trading in devices from the Shenzhen-based manufacturer, while interest from buyers fizzles. The numbers show that concerns around the company have extended beyond trade talks and corporate procurement and turned into backlash at retail, where Huawei makes most of its sales.

Gadget trade-in website WeBuyTek, which buys and resells about 36,000 handsets a year, has seen a 540% increase in the number of Huawei devices booked this week versus last. That's the biggest jump it's ever seen, the company's director, Paul Walsh, said by email. "'We have temporarily stopped accepting any new trade-ins, as we expect the value of these devices to plummet," he said... The website www.SellMyMobile.com reported a rise of up to 282% in the number of people assessing the value of their Huawei handsets from May 20 to May 22, compared with previous days, according to a representative...

The rush follows the decision by BT Group and Vodafone Group to pull the Huawei Mate 20 X phone from their launches of fifth-generation wireless products. The British carriers joined others from around the world, citing uncertainty after Huawei was cut off from U.S. companies by new trade restrictions and barred from receiving software support for the Android operating system from Alphabet Inc.'s Google.

In other news, Microsoft removed Huawei laptops from its online store on Friday.
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British Consumers Have Started To Dump Huawei Phones

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  • Metallica - Master of Puppets.mp3
  • And still..... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by chrism238 ( 657741 ) on Sunday May 26, 2019 @10:38AM (#58657070)
    ...not a single, publicly released piece of technical proof of any evil-doing.
    Politicians just destroying a Chinese company. FUD.
    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Freischutz ( 4776131 )

      ...not a single, publicly released piece of technical proof of any evil-doing. Politicians just destroying a Chinese company. FUD.

      Well the Chinese can do this too. Make a list of all the American/British companies that have spend years getting into the Chinese market and watch their market share evaporate. Lather rinse and repeat for any country that follows Trump's lead. One of the major lessons of the great depression was that nobody gains from tariff wars, but because America decided to elect a complete moron into the White House, we now have to suffer through an object less on in something we already know.

      • Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)

        by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Sunday May 26, 2019 @11:36AM (#58657268)
        Comment removed based on user account deletion
        • One of the major lessons of the great depression was that nobody gains from tariff wars,

          Modern economists don't really put much stock in the idea that tariffs played a significant role in the great depression. The main reasons for it were gross overproduction that hit right at the same time of a massive credit bubble bursting. The effect of that was manufacturers had bought and produced on credit, assuming others would buy on credit in a market where banks were suddenly going belly up left and right because of the credit fiasco.

          because America decided to elect a complete moron

          So says the guy who is still repeating 18th century nonsense by a grain merchant with a vested interest in reducing his tax burden (hint: David Ricardo).

          Tariffs played no significant role in the Great Depression? It seems some economists disagree with you: https://krugman.blogs.nytimes.... [nytimes.com]

          Protectionism was a result of the Depression, not a cause. Rising tariffs didn’t even play a large role in the initial trade contraction; like the spectacular trade contraction in the current crisis, the decline in trade in the early 30s was overwhelmingly the result of the overall economic implosion. Where protectionism really mattered was in preventing a recovery in trade when production recovered.

          You can go on til you are blue in the face but you will never convince me that tariffs and trade wars are a good idea.

      • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        All this is going to come back on us when China retaliates. It's not going to be pretty.

      • If Trump had gone after China first instead of everyone, all those other countries would be lining up to join the fight. They have plenty of examples of unfair China trade policies that harm their companies. First rule of warfare, avoid two front wars.
        • Exactly. China's steel dumping has damaged domestic steel production in a number of countries, including Canada. It's. It that targeted tariffs are necessarily bad, but unfocused and inexplicable tariffs against close allies who have their own grievances against China is completely counterproductive.

      • Well the Chinese can do this too.

        No, not so much.

    • Trump has suggested that there's an easy fix for the Huawei "security issues," and similarly to their CFO's legal issues, [fortune.com] it involves making concessions in his stupid-ass trade war:

      https://www.bbc.com/news/busin... [bbc.com]

    • by aliquis ( 678370 )

      Free trade is only fun as long as the US wins.

      • by rtb61 ( 674572 )

        Much like any other treaty the USA signs, only if it blatantly favours the USA and the second it longer does, treaty cancellation and new USA favourable treaty, not once but every single time throughout the history of the USA. Basically never in it's history has it been a government that can be trusted, simply not in it's DNA.

    • Politicians just destroying a Chinese company

      They're not just destroying a Chinese company any more than one anything important.

  • that begin to stink (Score:5, Interesting)

    by aepervius ( 535155 ) on Sunday May 26, 2019 @10:51AM (#58657112)
    We should push for country independent standard... No country (the US) should have the kind of power to crush commercially an enterprise on baseless allegation. And yet that is what they are doing. Most probably as a form of economic attack. Whatever you think of china, the whole thing not only leave a bad taste but cast shadows.
    • I'd have a whole lot more sympathy for the US if they'd file their complaints at https://www.wto.org/ [wto.org]

    • by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

      That's how it's supposed to work. You're supposed to complain to the WTO, and through them the international community takes collective action.

      Plan B, for the slightly roguish state, is to impose unilateral sanctions, tariffs, whatever. The US is big enough that they can do this, and it will hurt.

      This thing where the US imposes sanctions and then automatically enacts sanctions against anyone who doesn't follow suit is new.

    • American and European agricultural dumping wiping out 3rd world economies needs to stop too. If only we had a planetary government to take care of this.
      • If only we had a planetary government to take care of this.

        I.E. "if only we had an even bigger and more powerful government to tell us what to do."

        Good Christ, are you a fucking idiot.

    • Most probably as a form of economic attack

      An economic defense.

    • I agree no country (including US) should have the kind of power to crush an enterprise commercially on baseless allegation.
      The thing is, US, with help of their allies, used to crush not only commercially but also physically, and not only corporations, but also sovereign countries, routinely.
      But those weren't as mighty as this particular country and corporation at the moment. In the meantime, US warships lately tend to crash around, their tired sleep-deprived staff get scammed back home when paying taxes
  • to look for another source but if they got 2 phones last month and 12 this month that's your 540% increase right there.

    I'm just skeptical that enough consumers are paying enough attention to politics and tech combined to realize the impact of them not getting Google updates. And somebody that tech savvy can just side load the updates if google stops pushing them anyway.
    • by msauve ( 701917 )
      "to look for another source but if they got 2 phones last month and 12 this month that's your 540% increase right there. "

      You're using a rounding method I'm not familiar with. Please describe how it works.
  • by Anonymous Coward

    Do the American tech industries already know they can kiss their global market share goodbye?

  • To buy Huawei phone with LineageOS.

    Reasons: 1. Consumers dumping it. Screw the "trends" and dumb consumers that behave like hordes of zombies.
    2. White House / USG dumping it. Screw the USG and their shit arbitrary self-interest laws written and enforced by total subhuman scum.

    Be a rebel.
  • Because it's "highly likely" that the Chinese are spying on you. Oh, and Putin put them up to it.
  • In the long run this will lead to China and the parts of the world where US does not have control developing strong competing technologies. China is large, well educated, and efficient, so it will pull this off. In the short run, this will hurt US companies who have been supplying Huawei. Either way, that's a loss for the US, and probably no big deal (if not a long-term positive effect) for China.

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