The number of international patent applications filed by Huawei increased to 6,952 in 2021 from 5,464 in 2020
The protection and sharing of intellectual property rights is critical for the development of the global tech ecosystem, according to Chinese vendor Huawei.
“Protecting intellectual property is key to protecting innovation,” said Huawei’s Chief Legal Officer Song Liuping. “We are eager to license our patents and technologies to share our innovations with the world. This will help broaden the innovation landscape, drive our industry forward, and advance technology for everyone,” he added.
The number of international patent applications filed by Huawei increased to 6,952 in 2021 from 5,464 in 2020. However, the number of U.S. patents granted declined to 2,935 last year from 3,108 in 2021, while in Europe they dropped to 2,138 from 2,230 over that period. In China, the number of granted patents grew to 7,913 in 2021 from 6,324 the previous year.
“In the past five years, more than two billion smartphones have been licensed to Huawei’s 4G/5G patents. And for cars, about eight million connected vehicles licensed to Huawei patents are being delivered to the consumers every year,” said Alan Fan, head of the intellectual property rights department at Huawei.
Fan also said that Huawei is also working actively with patent license administration companies in offering “one-stop” licenses for mainstream standards.
“Over 260 companies—accounting for one billion devices—have obtained Huawei’s HEVC patent licenses through a patent pool,” Fan said. He added that the company is in discussions to establish a new patent pool to give the industry quick access to Huawei’s patents for Wi-Fi devices worldwide.
Huawei is also discussing joint licensing programs for 5G patents with licensing experts and other leading industry patentees.
Huawei reported 2021 annual revenue just shy of $100 billion, down 28.6% from the previous year. Net profits increased nearly 76% to $17.8 billion. The vendor also called out that R&D spend amounted to 22.4% of total annual revenue.
Broken down by business units, Huawei’s two biggest lines of revenue–its carrier and consumer segments–both showed year-over-year revenue decreases. On the other hand, the enterprise business unit grew just more than 2%.
In terms of revenue by region, China remains far-and-away Huawei’s biggest buyer followed by EMEA, the Americas and Asia-Pacific, all of which showed year-over-year decreases.
Huawei’s rotating chairman Ken Hu previously said in his keynote presentation at the Huawei Global Analyst Summit 2022, that Huawei was diversifying its portfolio as well as increasing R&D spending and focusing on operational efficiency, given the growing challenges faced by the vendor this year, which are even higher compared to 2021.
Among the current challenges faced by Huawei, Hu highlighted trade restrictions, geo-political conflicts, Covid-19, global inflation and foreign exchange fluctuations. “Surviving sustainably is very important for the company,” he said.
The executive said that these challenges made it imperative that Huawei’s business groups avoid high-risk areas, adding that the company needed to work hard to overcome these challenges.
