Chinese tech giant Huawei on Wednesday closed its operation for devices department in Bangladesh as the company witnessed a fall in device sales, including smartphones and tablet phones, due to its bar on using of Google-owned applications.
Huawei, a leading global provider of information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructure and smart devices, had been running its business in Bangladesh in two separate concerns - Huawei Technology (Bangladesh) and Huawei Devices.
Under Huawei Technology, it provides service in developing telecommunications network, and under Huawei Devices it sells smartphomne and other devices.
Employees of the Huawei Devices office, who were engaged in dealing with business of devices, confirmed this to Dhaka Tribune.
However, the core management of Huawei in Bangladesh denied from commenting on the issue.
“As per a prior notice issued by the company, September 30, 2020 was the last day for the employees as the company has decided to close its operation for devices in Bangladesh,” an official in the local office, seeking anonymity, told Dhaka Tribune.
He also said the decision came after the Google ban on use of its applications, which cast a negative impact on the sale of its devices in the country.
With the effect in business, the company shifted the responsibility of sales and after-sales service to the national distributors, he added.
Google has put a bar on the world's second biggest smartphone maker, which means that it would have no access to the very fundamentals of Android smartphones — such as Gmail, YouTube, Google Drive, and even Google Play Store to use on new products.
Meanwhile, talking to sales representatives of Huawei in several outlets in the capital, the Dhaka Tribune found that the sales of devices saw decline in recent months.
“Sales of Huawei devices fell in Bangladesh mainly due to the imposition of higher tax on import of smartphones to encourage local manufacturing, as well as the US ban on Huawei smartphones' access to Google apps,” Mohammad Arafat, a Huawei sales representative at an outlet in Mirpur area told Dhaka Tribune.
Another official, who lost his job due to the closure of operations, told Dhaka Tribune that the management of the company were shifting officials to its smart device division and technology department from November last year.
The process of shutting down the operation came to a final stage this year as its business saw decline in revenue. To minimize the cost, the company finally closed the operation, he added.
On the other hand, a high official of Huawei Technology (Bangladesh) Limited said the move was made to strengthen the distribution network and oversee the after-sales service.
On top of that, Huawei also will continue its technology business and operate the business of devices through their national distributors.
