Huawei launches in-house software system after being cut off from US services

Shenzhen, Apr. 20 (BNA) China’s Huawei Technologies (HWT.UL) said Thursday it is in the process of replacing in-house software management systems it acquired from US vendors with its own, hailing the move as a victory over US restrictions. Once her survival was threatened.


Huawei held an internal party to celebrate the transition to its MetaERP system in Dongguan, southern China, on Thursday, which was attended by rotating Huawei chairman Meng Wanzhou, daughter of company founder Ren Zhengfei.


According to Reuters, ERP software is used by companies to manage major business processes ranging from accounting to supply chain management.


“We were cut off from the old ERP system and other core operating and management systems three years ago,” said Tao Jingwen, Huawei Board Member and Head of Quality, Business Operations and IT Management.


“Today we are proud to announce that we broke that blockade, we survived!”


Huawei said in a press release that internal Meta-ERP software has been rolled out in 80% of the company’s business.


While Tao’s letter did not say whether Huawei intends to commercialize its own ERP system and compete with the likes of Oracle and SAP, it does offer a potential new line of business for the company that has been expanding into territories in a bid to survive under US pressure.


In May 2019, the US Department of Commerce added Huawei to a trade blacklist over alleged security concerns, which the company denies.


The listing and several successive rounds of trade sanctions have hampered Huawei’s ability to obtain goods made using US technology.


It also prevented it from servicing and patching the ERP tools it purchased largely from Oracle Corp (ORCL.N), according to a person familiar with the matter.


In his speech, Tao said the power outage was a “huge crisis” for Huawei, saying the legacy system has been the core of the company’s operations for more than two decades.


Referring to a famous desertion of the Chinese Red Army during the country’s civil war, Tao said, “Not having access to an ERP system became Huawei’s ‘Dado River’ that blocked our way forward and threatened our very existence.


The person said that Huawei’s “meta-ERP” system is a “cloud-native” product that uses the company’s cloud computing systems to achieve greater efficiency than traditional ERP products.


Tao said that while the old system was like “a massive old building in disrepair,” the new system has been fully tested and processes 15 million lines of accounting entries per day.


M