ZTE steps up lobbying efforts in apparent response to intelligence committee report

Chinese phone manufacturer ZTE has dramatically increased its lobbying efforts with the US Congress following a House Intelligence Committee report that said it and Huawei posed a threat to national security in the US. As noted by Bloomberg, this report effectively made it impossible for companies to use Huawei or ZTE networking equipment in their infrastructures. Prior to this report, ZTE spent about $80,000 for lobbying efforts over the course of six months. This year, the company has spent $330,000, essentially four times as much, in efforts to get its position heard in Congress.

The Congressional report claimed that Huawei and ZTE could be influenced by the Chinese government to spy on the US or compromise its power grid using equipment purchased and installed here by local companies. Both Huawei and ZTE have denied the allegations and called for further investigations.

ZTE did not provide a comment on the increased levels of spending, but given the lucrative opportunity that the networking infrastructure presents, it’s easy to see that it wants this negative report to go away. Unfortunately for the company, it’s probably going to cost a lot more than a few hundred thousand dollars in lobbying for that to happen.