Huawei Technologies announced that its H1 2022 net profit was half of what it was in 2021. The reason given for the decline in profits was the difficult economic conditions which curtailed demand from customers. This was further compounded by U.S. technology restrictions.
As per the release, revenue dropped 5.9 percent year-on-year during the period to 301.6 billion yuan ($44.73 billion), with a sharper decline during January-March.
“While our device business was heavily impacted, our ICT infrastructure business maintained steady growth,” said Ken Hu, Huawei’s rotating chairman, referring to its business to business enterprise unit.
A weak economy, COVID-19 disruptions and supply chain challenges hurt the company’s device business that sells smartphones and laptops, a company spokesperson said.
Huawei also boosted investment into new technology and businesses, which impacted profit.
In addition, second-quarter sales in the wider Chinese smartphone industry fell 14.2 percent year-on-year, while volumes hit a decade low.
However despite this, Huawei is building new business lines, including smart car components and energy efficiency systems, with its cloud services business, taking 18 percent of China’s growing market, according to consultancy Canalys.
Huawei has also rolled out its own proprietary Harmony operating system, which is now being used on 300 million Huawei devices. “We will harness trends in digitalization and decarbonisation to keep creating value for our customers and partners, and secure quality development,” said Hu.
