Huawei, a leading global ICT solutions provider, has today announced it is to invest £10million to support technology research programmes with world-renowned British universities. The funding, part of Huawei's previously announced US$2 billion investment commitment to the UK, will be implemented by 2017 and strengthens the company’s partnership with British higher education.

The £10m investment includes key collaborations with the major British universities, with the research programmes focusing on advanced multimedia, IT and optical technology, green radio, 5G technologies, optical technology, wireless communications and product engineering.

The significant level of funding for these university schemes has been made available through Huawei’s Innovation Research Programme, which extends the company’s long-term focus on research and development into the academic world by forging partnerships with global educational institutions. Every year Huawei invests over 10% of its revenue into R&D, in 2012 this equaled to US$4.8 billion.

It is expected that the research programmes will help significantly increase Huawei’s understanding of these cutting-edge technologies and thereby improve the consumer, network and enterprise services and solutions it offers. Huawei already counts BT and EE among its network customers in the UK and is currently the world’s third-largest smartphone vendor*.

David Willetts MP, Minister for Universities and Science, following a visit to Huawei’s Shanghai R&D centre today, said: "This investment is a vote of confidence in UK universities and their world-leading science and technology skills. We want to encourage greater links between innovative businesses and our research-focused universities. Attracting global companies, like Huawei, shows we are realising these ambitions."

Victor Zhang, Chief Executive of Huawei UK, said: "This collaboration with UK’s universities is an excellent initiative. As the global technology economy continues to grow, new innovation is fundamental, and these research projects will ensure the UK is at the forefront of developments in wireless, multimedia and advanced communications.

"As a global leader in the technology industry, we believe we have a responsibility to nurture the next generation of talent. The research partnerships we’re announcing today with British universities are a sign of that commitment, and we passionately believe that greater collaboration across cultures fosters a unique learning environment and a truly global workforce that benefits everyone."

Huawei Undergraduate Programmes---Telecom Seeds for the Future

The £10m investment also builds on Huawei’s existing investment into the UK’s education system. Since 2011 the company has worked with the UK Government to fund an undergraduate exchange programme that enables students to visit China for five weeks, spending two weeks in Beijing to understand the culture and three weeks in Shenzhen, where Huawei is headquartered, to experience working life. This year 18 students took part in the programme and Huawei’s objective is to increase this to 50 per year from UK universities, by 2017.

* IDC Worldwide Quarterly Mobile phone Tracker, 29th October 2013: http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS24418013