Telus and Bell are afraid of paying the "Huawei case" to pay a $ 1 billion salted bill if Justin Trudeau blocks the Chinese giant 5G network.

"It's going to cost them a lot if we have to go off the equipment they've already paid for," says Richard Paradis, lecturer in communication policy at the Université de Montréal and president of Groupe CIC.

Blocking Huawei would mean at least $ 1 billion in financial losses for Telus and Bell, according to The Globe and Mail. Worse still, consumers would pay the price and it could even translate into job losses, according to the daily newspaper.

Joined by Le Journal , the Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's office did not want to react to these fears, sending us back to the Communications Security Establishment (CSE), which thanked us for our questions without being able to answer them.

More than $ 1 billion

For the experts consulted by Le Journal , the figure of $ 1 billion is far from being exaggerated because the 5G infrastructure is anything but light and its establishment on the Canadian territory is expensive.

"This is not an exaggeration because it requires a lot of investment to install the 5G which requires that we put tens of thousands of antennas everywhere," notes Richard Paradis, president of CIC Group.

For his part, the professor at the Department of Management of Laval University, Yan Cimon, emphasizes that the big players of the telecom seriously evaluate the financial risks related to the replacement of these technos.

"It's not just the hardware costs, there are those related to the training and planning of certain aspects of the network. There are plenty of details that go far beyond the equipment, "says Cimon.

Even if Ottawa still refuses to say if it will ban Huawei, other countries of the "Group of Five", such as the United States, Australia and New Zealand, have said they will avoid the equipment manufacturer Asian.

In Britain, the telecom BT Group will turn its back on the Chinese company and will even remove all traces of Huawei hardware in its existing 3G and 4G networks.

"As a precautionary principle"

In France, Orange, whose main shareholder is the government, has also indicated that it will no longer choose Huawei "as a precautionary principle".

Last Monday, Huawei Canada Vice President of Corporate Affairs, Scott Bradley, told the Journal that the Chinese company has been well established here for the past decade and is still doing business with Canada's largest companies.

Joined by Le Journal , Telus and Bell spokespersons did not return our calls yesterday.