Huawei sells Honor under ‘tremendous pressure’ from US sanctions
- Huawei has sold Honor to Shenzhen Zhixin New Information Technology Co.
- Once the sale is complete, Huawei will no longer have a stake in Honor.
- Honor will work with partners to continue to provide security updates and customer support for its phones.
Update: November 19, 2020 (1:06 AM ET): Honor has confirmed that it will work with partners to continue to provide security updates and after-sales service for smartphone shutdowns and those currently for sale. The company released the update on Weibo in response to a user’s request about the future of Honor phones under new ownership. We still don’t know if existing or future Honor phones will still have access to Huawei technologies like the EMUI software, camera sensors, and more.
Original article: Nov. 16, 2020 (11:39 p.m. ET): Huawei has finally sold its sub-brand Honor after weeks of rumors about the sale. The new owner of the Honor brand is a company called Shenzhen Zhixin New Information Technology Co. According to a joint statement from 40 companies involved in the purchase, it is reportedly a consortium of over 30 agents and distributors.
In a statement on the development, Huawei attributed the sale of Honor to “the enormous pressure” its business was under due to US sanctions. The company says “persistent unavailability of technical elements” required for its wireless business has forced it to sell all of Honor’s business goods.
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Once the sale is complete, Huawei will not have any stake in Honor or be involved in any decision-making activities. “This step was taken by Honor’s industrial chain to ensure its own survival,” Huawei stated in its statement.
Honor was founded in 2013 to sell affordable phones that would allow Huawei to compete with other low-cost Chinese phone manufacturers in online retail. The brand later diversified into wearables and smart home products like smartwatches, TWS headphones, air purifiers, and more.
Huawei claims the subsidiary ships over 70 million units annually to date. It is unclear which direction Honor will go under its new owner, but the joint statement mentioned above states that Honor’s direction of development will not be affected.
Huawei concluded its sales announcement by saying, “We look forward to Honor continuing to create value for consumers and create a new smart world for young people.”
