Servicing Huawei in West Africa: the world’s largest telecommunications equipment company

Huawei Technologies Niger, a subsidiary of Huawei Technologies (a leading global information and communications technology (ICT) solutions provider and the largest telecommunications equipment maker in the world), needed to comply with legal requirements set by the YSCOA (West African Accounting System) in terms of turnover and number of employees. Huawei Niger had to appoint a Statutory Auditor for the certification of its financial statements. The particularity of the client lay in the way its financial statements are established: Huawei Niger uses an integrated management system set up by the Group, with IFRS accounting standards. This required conducting both an IT audit and a financial audit to check the coherence in the recording and accounting procedures as well as to control data in the system. Another obstacle was the financial reporting framework used by the Client (IFRS), which needed to be mapped against local accounts (OHADA).

HLB KMC West Africa conducted a comprehensive audit engagement that included both IT audit and financial audit. The strategy involved establishing a mapping to check the similarity and differences between IFRS accounts and local accounts (OHADA). The team interviewed key officials, read and got familiar with the system guidelines and procedures to better understand operations and performed adequate tests to verify information accuracy. The audit engagement was successfully conducted in English at the request of the client, despite Niger being a French-speaking country. The assignment and reports were carried out in English to meet client requirements.

The audit engagement was successfully conducted. Huawei Technologies Niger was very satisfied with the engagement in general and agreed to follow and implement recommendations resulting from the audit. Multiple relevant recommendations were made by the firm's team of professional auditors that are valuable for the company to improve both their management and daily operations.