Huawei unveils new inventions set to revolutionise AI, 5G and user experience

• Huawei recognised its ten most outstanding inventions of 2022, from a neural network that reduces energy consumption to an “optical iris” for fibre networks.

Shenzhen, China, June 2022.- Huawei announced a series of key inventions as part of its biennial “Top 10 Inventions” awards during the “Broadening the Horizons of Innovation 2022” forum held at the company’s headquarters in Shenzhen.

The award was conceived to recognise inventions that could create new product ranges, become important commercial features of existing products or generate considerable value for both the company and the industry.

The award-winning inventions range from an adder neural network that significantly reduces energy consumption and circuit size to a revolutionary “optical iris” that gives optical fibres a unique identifier. It is designed to help operators manage network resources, reducing the time and costs associated with broadband deployment.

The presentation took place in the context of intellectual property rights, whose protection and sharing Huawei considers essential to the technology ecosystem.

“Protecting IP is fundamental to protecting innovation,” said Huawei’s Chief Legal Officer, Song Liuping. “We want to license our patents and technologies to share our innovations with the world, as this will help broaden the horizons of innovation, drive industry progress and make technology better for everyone,” he added.

“Huawei is constantly evolving and continually demonstrating the value of China’s IP to the world,” said Tian Lipu, president of the China office of the International Association for the Protection of Intellectual Property.

At the end of 2021, Huawei held more than 110,000 active patents across more than 45,000 patent families. It has more granted patents than any other Chinese company, filed the largest number of patent applications with the European Patent Office and ranked fifth for new patent grants in the United States. For five consecutive years, Huawei has ranked first worldwide for applications under the Patent Cooperation Treaty.

Alan Fan, head of Huawei’s Intellectual Property Rights Department, said the value of the company’s patents is widely recognised in the industry, especially for widespread standards such as mobile technology, Wi-Fi and audio/video codecs.

“Over the last five years, more than two billion smartphones have been licensed under Huawei’s 4G/5G patents. As for cars, some eight million connected vehicles licensed under Huawei patents are made available to consumers every year,” said Fan.

Huawei is also actively working with patent licensing administrators to offer “one-stop” licences for major standards.

“More than 260 companies — representing a billion devices — have obtained licences to Huawei’s HEVC patents through patent pools,” said Fan, adding that the company is looking into founding a new patent pool “to give the industry quick access to [Huawei’s] patents for devices worldwide”.

Huawei is also exploring joint licensing programmes for 5G patents with licensing experts and leading industry patent holders.

Liu Hua, director of the World Intellectual Property Organization’s China Office, praised Huawei’s continued focus on innovation, saying: “We look forward to seeing Huawei continue to take part in high-level global competition, with innovation at its core.”

For Manuel Desantes, former vice-president of the European Patent Office, given the immense number of changes currently taking place in the world, the number of registered patents or inventions is no longer what matters most. “The IP system should ensure that the creations that deserve protection are those that bring real value,” he said.

This is the third event focused on innovation and IP that Huawei has held on its innovation practices. Every year Huawei invests more than 10% of its sales revenue in R&D.

In recent years, it has invested more than 20 billion yuan a year in basic research. In 2021, the company increased its R&D investment to CNY142.7 billion, representing 22.4% of its total revenue. Both R&D spending and the percentage of R&D spending reached their highest levels in the last ten years. In terms of R&D spending, Huawei ranked second in the 2021 EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard. Over the last decade, Huawei’s total R&D investment has exceeded CNY845 billion.

About Huawei

Huawei is a provider of information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructure and smart devices. With integrated solutions across four key domains – telecom networks, IT, smart devices and cloud services – we are committed to bringing digital to every person, home and organisation for a fully connected, intelligent world. Our end-to-end portfolio of products, solutions and services is both competitive and secure. Through open collaboration with ecosystem partners, we create lasting value for our customers, working to empower people, enrich home life and inspire innovation in organisations of all shapes and sizes. At Huawei, innovation focuses on customer needs. We invest heavily in basic research, concentrating on technological breakthroughs that drive the world forward. We have more than 180,000 employees and operate in more than 170 countries and regions. Founded in 1987, Huawei is a private company fully owned by its employees.

For more information, visit www.huawei.com

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