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According to Ericsson-CEO Borje Ekholm, Europe runs the risk of lagging behind other regions in the roll-out of 5G. The cause is nervous regulation and weak investment. Concerns about network security have less to do with this, says Ekholm. That’s what Reuters says.

According to Ekholm, high spectrum costs, regulatory uncertainty and a lack of investment are greater and more important concerns. “This has much more to do with how attractive it is to invest in 5G,” said the top executive at the Mobile World Congress (MWC).

Ekholm referred to the calls by the United States to its allies to expel Huawei and other Chinese suppliers for national security reasons. The US fears that equipment from such manufacturers will be misused for espionage by the Chinese government. According to the Americans, there is a Chinese law obliging companies to cooperate with espionage requests.

Ekholm did not take a position in this matter. “It’s really up to the nations to decide how to implement their national security policies,” said the top man.

The Netherlands

Earlier this month GroenLinks stated that it is a bad idea for the Netherlands to use equipment from Huawei and other Chinese suppliers in 5G networks. “However, for the time being there is no ban on the equipment in the Netherlands.

Huawei has always denied all accusations. Ren Zhengfei, founder and CEO of Huawei, said in January that his company has never spyed for the Chinese government and will never do so. The UK intelligence services also concluded that it is possible to reduce the risk of using Huawei equipment in 5G networks. However, several other countries have imposed a ban on Chinese manufacturers.

This news article was automatically translated from Dutch to give Techzine.eu a head start. All news articles after September 1, 2019 are written in native English and NOT translated. All our background stories are written in native English as well. For more information read our launch article.