“Quebec Universities Share Intellectual Property with Controversial Huawei: Investigation”

A third of Quebec universities have active research projects with the controversial Huawei company and some of them outright share the intellectual property of their discoveries with the Chinese giant, our Bureau of Investigation has learned.

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Six of the 18 universities have ties with the company Huawei, which was excluded from the development of the 5G network last year for national security networks (see table opposite).

Among them, McGill University, Laval University and the National Institute for Scientific Research (INRS) have filed patents in the past two years or are in the process of patenting research carried out with Huawei.

It is impossible to know which new Quebec discoveries will soon be patented with the Chinese company, because a patent application is subject to a confidentiality period that can go up to 18 months after its filing.

National security concerns

But even if it is allowed, this sharing of intellectual property with the Chinese company, reputed to be close to the Chinese government, as well as its access to research and the facilities of Quebec universities, worries several national security experts.

“Huawei manages to gain access to knowledge that would cost it much more to develop in China. Quebecers therefore find themselves supporting the development of technologies on behalf of China that could be misused. It’s disturbing,” said Charles Burton, of the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, a former counselor at the Canadian Embassy in China.

Universities have known what to expect for several years regarding the risks of espionage. As early as 2017-2018, they were met by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, which informed them of concerns about the security of the research.

The ambassador warned

The former ambassador of Canada to the People’s Republic of China from 2012 to 2016, Guy Saint-Jacques, claims to have also warned the institutions when he held this position.

“I had discussed it with universities. The agreements at the time specified that only Huawei had intellectual property. I had asked the universities how this was possible since they were financed by the governments. I believe that the more recent contracts are clearer on the sharing of technology. But Huawei will continue to invest here because our researchers are excellent. […] And it is clear that this helps to develop Huawei and that the Chinese government wants the company to dominate internationally,” he said.

Over the past few days, our Bureau of Investigation revealed that Concordia University had received a $128,000 donation from Huawei in June 2022, a month after the Chinese giant was excluded from the development of the 5G network. We also revealed that three universities were currently conducting secret research with Huawei.

Several links with Huawei

Laval University

• Three joint patent applications filed
• Two patents published in 2021 and 2023 in the field of fiber optics
• Four research projects with a total budget of more than $10M
• Donation of $100,000 since 2021 for scholarships in the field of optics-photonics

McGill University

• Two patent applications published for two years on wireless communication and algorithms
• A “limited number of confidential research agreements” are in progress

National Institute for Scientific Research (INRS)

• A patent application filed within the last two years
• Three ongoing research projects, two of which relate to communications technology and one confidential
• Donation of $2000 received for the organization of a congress

Montreal university

• Five-year agreement signed in 2019 with Huawei for a $3.9 million donation to support research in the computer science department

Polytechnique Montreal

• A research project is underway on numerical optimization and machine learning
• A “confidential” research project is also taking place

Concordia

• Donation of $128,000 for a research project