Whoever wounds by protectionism perishes by protectionism. In the tariff war unleashed by the American president there is one aspect that has been little talked about and which could instead upset the future of the world economy in the coming years: technology. And it is said that the revolution of techno-nationalism, or of technological sovereignty whatever, it will benefit the United States. On the contrary. While the 15% duties on Chinese products that were still outside the trade barriers are about to take effect (in theory on December 15th) (including electronics, but with an ad hoc exemption for Apple which, as is known, produces in China) , Beijing has already responded by announcing that already in 2022 all public offices in the country of 1,3 billion inhabitants will have to use only Chinese hardware and software.
The big news, on which Xi Jinping has obviously been working for some time, is that in addition to confirming his global leadership in the hardware market (i.e. machines), China is preparing to break the monopoly of American over the tops (Google, Windows, Apple) on operating systems. China will therefore become technologically independent and will be able to break US hegemony not only by virtue of a larger internal market, but by leveraging its growing geopolitical influence, also at a technological level: in fact, Beijing has already digitally colonized almost all of Asia ( excluding India) and is filling the "gaps" left by the Western powers in increasingly numerous areas of Africa and Latin America.
Not to mention the networks: Huawei with 5G technology has already seduced Italy and Europe, burning the competition in time. The Chinese giant, which not surprisingly entered Trump's blacklist, contributed 2018 billion euros to European growth in 12,8, supporting around 170.000 jobs both directly and through related industries. Huawei has already opened 23 research laboratories in 12 European countries (2 of which are dedicated to 5G), has activated joint projects with around 140 European universities, and finances doctorates. Just Huawei in Europe has made a first experiment of "disentanglement" from Google's operating system, Android: in the autumn in Munich it launched the new Mate 30 series of smartphones, including the range-topping 30 Pro and the elegant 30 Rs Porsche Design.
To remedy the lack of Google licenses for Android, the Shenzhen company has included one as an operating system open source version of Android, supported by the App Gallery instead of the Play Store to download and install applications such as Facebook or WhatsApp. He practically managed to make all of them downloadable except, of course, those marked by Google and therefore missing YouTube, Maps, Gmail and Calendar, to name a few. The move gives an idea of how even the US-China challenge is now even in the technological field, and how much things could change in a few years if Beijing really started producing indigenous software.
And Europe? For now, the Old Continent is at the window, but it will in any case tip the scales to decree the winner (if there will be one…) of the challenge of technological sovereignty. And at the moment it winks more towards the East. First of all, the right e demonstrates it tough battle waged by the Brussels Antitrust against abuses of dominant positions of the stars and stripes over the top, with even very heavy fines that have reached Google and Facebook in particular. Then, there is the unpleasant tax issue, now increasingly perceived as a priority on this side of the Atlantic, so much so that the new Commission has announced the web tax, however, unleashing the ire of Trump who has already threatened tariffs, especially on French products. Finally, the question of privacy, with Europe always very careful to regulate a matter in which the irruption of China could shuffle the cards.
So what will happen in the near future? Difficult to predict, and even more difficult to hypothesize whether the changes will benefit the Italian and European economy and consumers. What is certain is that digital globalisation, always been the prerogative of the US and the Western world, is gradually crumbling and that by now even in a market that is global par excellence, such as the technological one, the nationalist escalation will once again change our habits.
