Here's the (Chinese) cure for US unemployment:
Huawei Technologies invests in U.S. company
Latest Updated by 2004-02-09 09:14:42
Extending its reach into the U.S. market, major Chinese telecom equipment maker Huawei Technologies Co. has invested US$2 million in an American company that makes wireless optical devices.
Huawei was among several venture capital investors who took part in a US$17 million fund-raising effort by San Diego, California-based LightPointe Communications Inc, said John Griffin, LightPointe's president and chief executive Tuesday (Feb. 3).
Other investors included U.S.-based Sevin Rosen Funds and RhoVentures.
Huawei is one of many Chinese corporations looking for footholds abroad, hoping to develop new markets and burnish their international brand images.
"As Huawei gets to be more and more of a worldwide telecom player, I believe they are going to behave like every other large telecom manufacturer,'' Griffin said. "They are very committed in making great strides outside of China.''
LightPointe makes what it calls wireless optical or free-space optics equipment. The technology uses pulses of laser light to send data through open air. It's usually used to complement fiber-optic networks, by filling gaps where laying fiber optic cable --- which also uses light pulses ---- would be too expensive or difficult.
Griffin said the company's annual sales are in "the low tens of millions'' of U.S. dollars, with about half coming from the Asia-Pacific region, and a large share of that from China.
Shenzhen-based Huawei distributes LightPointe's optical equipment under Huawei's own brand name under an arrangement set last March that gives LightPointe access to the Chinese company's extensive sales network on the mainland.
Griffin would not say what share of LightPointe Huawei now owns.
Privately owned Huawei reported that its sales jumped 42 percent last year over a year earlier to US$3.83 billion, with a little more than a quarter coming from outside China.
In another development, the South China Morning Post reported Saturday that Huawei Technologies became a minority shareholder of Hong Kong mobile phone operator Sunday Communications Ltd.
Quoting a Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing Ltd. document, the paper said that Huawei had disclosed it had accumulated three million shares in Sunday between 47.3 HK cents and 58 HK cents each. That raised Huawei's stake in Sunday to 5.01 percent, above the 5 percent threshold that makes disclosure of interest compulsory.
The newspaper said that the two companies formed a partnership in December, under which Huawei would supply equipment and finance Sunday's rollout of third-generation wireless services.
Editor: Donald
By: Source:szdaily
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