Micron said in a Wednesday earnings call that it's received licenses from the U.S. government to sell at least some of its products to Huawei. The company doesn't expect these licenses to have a significant impact on its revenue in the short term, however, although it was quick to acknowledge them as "a positive development."
A quick refresher: Huawei was added to the U.S. Department of Commerce's Entity List in May. That addition limited the kinds of goods U.S. suppliers could sell to the Chinese telecommunications company. Affected companies have lobbied on Huawei's behalf, though, and the U.S. government's made a few concessions.
In August, Reuters reported that 130 companies applied for licenses to sell their products to Huawei. In the meantime, many reportedly continued to do business with Huawei by exploiting a loophole in U.S. regulations and, therefore, mitigating the ban's impact on their revenues.
Now, it seems the U.S. government has started to issue licenses that allow American companies to supply Huawei without relying on regulatory loopholes.
During the earnings call, Micron CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said the company had received licenses in the mobile and server businesses but that he doesn't expect them to have a notable impact on revenue over the next two quarters.
"As previously disclosed, we are continuing to ship some products to Huawei that are not subject to Export Administration Regulations and Entity List restrictions. We applied for, and recently received, all requested licenses that enable us to provide support for these products, as well as qualify new products for Huawei’s mobile and server businesses," Mehrotra said.
"Additionally, these licenses allow us to ship previously restricted products that we manufacture in the United States, which represent a very small portion of our sales. However, there are still some products outside of the mobile and server markets that we are unable to sell to Huawei."
