FILE PHOTO: U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross meets with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis (not pictured) at the Maximos Mansion in Athens, Greece September 5, 2019. REUTERS/Costas Baltas/File Photo

(Reuters) - U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said licenses for U.S. companies to sell components to China’s Huawei Technologies Co will come “very shortly,” in an interview with Bloomberg published on Sunday.

Ross said the licenses “will be forthcoming very shortly” and that the U.S. government had received 206 requests.

“That’s a lot of applications - it’s frankly more than we would’ve thought,” Ross added.

Huawei did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In May, Huawei, the world’s largest telecoms equipment provider, was put under a U.S. blacklist citing national security concerns, effectively banning it from buying American-made parts without a special license, while U.S. companies were banned from selling to Huawei without carrying a special license.

U.S. President Donald Trump promised in June to provide some relief to firms that did business with Huawei.

On U.S.-China trade developments, Ross said there was no reason the deal could not be on track to be signed this month.

“We are in good shape, we are making good progress, and there is no natural reason why it could not be,” Bloomberg quoted Ross as saying.