When Google announced that it is excluding Huawei out of its Android partnership, half the globe panicked, especially Huawei customers who just walked away with a new P30 and Mate 20 Series smartphone, the ban has caused a drop in resell values and sales revenue for Huawei dealers.
While Huawei has been prepping for this day to come by stockpiling crucial US components, it has also begin development of its own operating system as an alternative to Android.
Hongmeng OS, the company’s own mobile operating system that has been in development since 2012, is claimed to be 60% faster than Android and will run Android apps, it is a bold statement from the company and the very reason why it should continue to reveal the OS despite the ban lift.
A new smartphone operating system is needed
Before you go ‘Oh, look at Symbian, Bada OS, webOS, they all failed’, I have to say that smartphone software innovation has been rather stagnant as of late, where you choose to get locked into Apple’s iOS ecosystem or go for team Android, however the feature gap between them aren’t really too different, as you will usually find one copies and enhance each other’s features in their annual OS announcement.
How can Hongmeng OS change this? Its not as simple as merely being a new competition in town and kill off the rest, but Huawei could very well take this advantage to create a new ecosystem for its hardware, just like how Apple did it with MacBooks and iPads, which will eventually depend less on Android, bypass any potential roadblocks in the future and take full advantage of its AI-capable Kirin SoC.
I’m not expecting Hongmeng OS to come with a revolutionary UI like the iPhone once did, as it will be most likely based on EMUI with some minor changes, but what I’m really hoping to see is that it can eventually become the next iOS, even if it is actually based on Android AOSP, so let’s hope Huawei will continue unveil it in the next few months.