Update | ZTE could resume operations ‘within weeks’ following Trump’s pledge to help the company

An unexpected tweet from US President Donald Trump over the weekend could soon see China’s No 2 telecoms equipment maker ZTE Corp resume normal operations after it was hit with an export ban a month ago, signalling a potential compromise between the world’s two largest economies amid a looming trade war.

China’s top economic official Liu He will lead a Chinese trade delegation to Washington between May 15 and 19, after talks with the US government’s seven-man delegation in Beijing earlier this month failed to produce any concrete result over simmering trade tensions.

Liu’s trip was confirmed soon after US President Donald Trump pledged in a tweet on Sunday to help give ZTE “a way back into business, fast”, after it was banned from buying from US suppliers for seven years. “Too many jobs in China lost. Commerce Department has been instructed to get it done!” Trump tweeted, adding that he was working with Chinese President Xi Jinping to help the company resume operations.

Shenzhen-based ZTE, which was forced to halt “major operations” because of its high reliance on US technology, is expected to resume production within the next two to three weeks, according to analysts.

“We always believed ZTE would eventually be removed from the export ban [but] bear in mind that China also has some leverage in the negotiation process, ranging from North Korea to China’s regulatory approval of Qualcomm’s acquisition of NXP,” Edison Lee, head of telecoms research at Jefferies Hong Kong, said in a note on Monday.