Chinese vendor Huawei has had its main appeal against the terms of the Swedish auction declined, so it looks set to go ahead as planned.
The news comes courtesy of Reuters, which reports that a Swedish court has ruled that a previous ruling allowing the auction to go ahead despite Huawei’s legal objections can’t be appealed. Huawei, however, says it’s still waiting for a couple of other legal actions to run their course and has apparently warned of ‘serious consequences’ if the auction is allowed to go ahead before those are resolved.
The decision to make the Swedish 5G auction conditional on the winners not using Huawei or ZTE kit in their networks was made by the Swedish Post and Telecom Authority (PTS). Huawei’s legal objection to the decision was referred by the PTS to the administrative court of Stockholm, which ruled against it. It’s Huawei’s appeal of that decision that has just been rejected, so it seems to be officially out of the Swedish 5G market.
Paradoxically, one of the people who will probably be most upset by the decision will be Ericsson CEO, who has lobbied vigorously on Huawei’s behalf over this matter. He is presumed to be worried about reciprocal action against Ericsson in China, so let’s see how that goes now. Meanwhile Ericsson has just been selected by APT to help build first 5G Multi-Operator Core Network in Taiwan. That’s sure to cheer the Chinese government up.