ZTE will have an opportunity to ask the U.S. Commerce Department to change its mind regarding the government’s decision to ban U.S. corporations from selling hardware or software to ZTE for a period of seven years.
An official at the Commerce Department said the agency has given ZTE permission to present more information regarding the actions it took in the wake of its 2017 settlement. ZTE agreed to pay a hefty fine and reprimand 35 executives.
The Commerce Department says ZTE did not reprimand those execs and then misrepresented the facts. The agency said this created a breach of trust and it announced the ban earlier this week. According to the Wall Street Journal,
“ZTE doesn’t have administrative appeal rights under agency regulations, but the agency had agreed to receive the evidence through informal procedures in the near future.”
It’s unclear what these informal procedures are, nor what impact they might have on the Commerce Department’s decision.
The ban will prevent ZTE from using mobile processors from Qualcomm and perhaps the Android operating system from Google.
ZTE itself said the ban will severely impact the company’s chance of survival. Google hasn’t commented on the matter directly.
