14 September 2020

The announcement comes after several countries including the UK and Canada reduced or eliminated Huawei’s role in developing 5G networks

Singapore’s leading telecom providers selected Nordic firms Ericsson and Nokia to develop the city-state’s main 5G network, joining a growing list of countries that have limited Huawei’s role in building the next-generation wireless network.

Singapore Telecommunications, which is the country’s largest telecom, chose to use equipment from Sweden’s Ericsson after a “rigorous tender process,” while the StarHub-M1 joint venture picked Finland’s Nokia after Singapore gave the final green-light to telecoms for the city-state’s 5G rollout.

Huawei, meanwhile, will work with Australia’s TPG Telecom, which is set to build a smaller network in Singapore.

The announcement comes after several countries including the UK and Canada reduced or eliminated Huawei’s role in developing 5G networks amid pressure from the US to exclude the Chinese player on national security grounds.  

However, Singapore’s minister for communications and information S. Iswaran emphasised that Singapore Telecommunications didn’t “exclude any vendor,” in an interview with Bloomberg. “You have a diversity of vendors involved in different aspects of the world 5G system.”

The US has long alleged that Huawei maintains a tight relationship with the Chinese government and that equipment from the company could be used to spy on other countries and companies. Huawei has repeatedly denied this.

Singapore is expected to roll out its 5G service early next year, with plans to cover the entire city-state by 2025 at the latest. 5G, the next generation of wireless networks that has been rolling out across the world, is live in a number of major US cities, as well as parts of China, South Korea and the UK, among other countries. The new technology is will make downloads and uploads ultrafast, but it is also poised to power everything from self-driving cars to advanced augmented reality experiences.