Huawei, known for its telecoms equipment and smartphones, signed or renewed over 20 patent licensing deals this year, said Steven Geiszler, the company’s US chief intellectual property counsel. Among licensors announced Thursday were several automakers, including Mercedes-Benz, Audi, Porsche and BMW, that are seeking to add more communications technologies to their vehicles.

“By getting a return on our R&D investment, it allows us to re-invest and re-invent,” Geiszler said, referring to research and development.

The automakers did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Huawei generated about US$1.2 billion globally from licenses over the three years ended 2021, or roughly hundreds of millions of dollars annually, Geiszler said. Its full-year sales figures for 2022 will not be tallied until next year, and the licensing unit’s profits or losses are not accounted for independently, he said.

Those figures are small relative to the billions of dollars in annual sales Huawei has lost due to US curbs on Chinese technology since 2019 that have stung its ability to sell in places such as the US and Europe.

But the company has grown more aggressive in striking deals for its patents over the past two years to at least make up some ground. In addition, in some cross-licensing agreements where money previously never exchanged hands, Huawei is now getting cash to balance out the deals since it is selling fewer devices that use the patents it had secured.

As publicly disclosed technology, the patents are not subject to US restrictions, Geiszler said.