Huawei, Chinese chip makers keep factories humming despite coronavirus outbreak
- Huawei, the world’s largest telecoms equipment supplier, restarted operations at its Dongguan factory on February 3
- Chip foundry SMIC and memory maker YMTC kept plants running through the Lunar New Year holiday
Some technology firms in China have maintained operations to manufacture parts and products despite government calls in various cities and provinces for companies to halt work to help stop the spread of a new coronavirus.
Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei Technologies said on Monday it had resumed production of goods, including consumer devices and carrier equipment, and operations were running normally.
The Shenzhen-based company restarted manufacturing after the Lunar New Year holiday in line with a special exemption that allows certain critical industries to remain in operation, despite Beijing’s call to halt all work in some cities and provinces.
A spokesman for Huawei, the world’s largest telecoms equipment supplier, said most of the production was in Dongguan, a city in the southern province of Guangdong.
Other companies have also kept production running, in some cases even through the Lunar New Year, in a sign of the critical importance Beijing places on its domestic technology supply chain, a subject of friction with the United States
