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HONG KONG — Huawei Technologies Co. reported a steepening decline in revenue in the first quarter, as its smartphone sales tumbled and the Chinese tech giant continued to struggle under U.S. sanctions.
The Shenzhen-based company blamed the drop in revenue in part on the sale of its budget smartphone unit, Honor, in November. But Huawei’s overall smartphone sales shrank globally after U.S. restrictions blocked its phones from running Google apps and other U.S. software.
Revenue fell 16.5% from a year earlier to 152.2 billion yuan, the equivalent of about $23.5 billion, during the first quarter, the company said. It was the second straight quarterly drop, following a decline of 11.2% in the fourth quarter.
The company, which is closely held and publishes a limited financial snapshot every three months, didn’t release quarterly income figures, but it said its net profit margin rose 3.8 percentage points to 11.1%. It attributed that rise to patent royalty income of $600 million and efforts to improve its operations and management efficiency.
An expanded version of this article appears on WSJ.com.
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