Huawei to introduce its own OS?

HuaweiCentral has confirmed that Huawei will launch its own Operating System, following Google’s decision to remove them from the Android platform. The new OS would be served under the word “Hongmeng”

The new Huawei OS will run all the Android Applications. Additionally, the Huawei’s consumer business CEO Yu Chengdong has confirmed the same thing.

According to a report by Chinese publication Caijing, Richard Yu, the CEO of Huawei Consumer Business Group, has revealed details about Huawei’s OS. It will apparently be available later this Fall or early next year on phones, computers, tablets, TVs, cars, and wearables. The OS will be compatible with all Android apps and they can also be recompiled to improve performance.

After the news of Google revoking Huawei’s Android license, many assumed that they would simply build an OS based on AOSP. It may not be that simple. They may not be able to use any OS that contains copyright belonging to a U.S. company. So this news of Android app support is a pretty big deal since other Android alternatives, such as Tizen, do not support Android apps out of the box.

Huawei devices have become incredibly popular over the last few years, meaning there are millions of people relying on Android apps on their Huawei phones. People won’t want to give up those apps if they move to a new Huawei device.

The Information reports that rather than being ready this Fall or early next year as per some reports, they claim the OS is “far from ready.” It is reportedly being referred to as “Project Z” internally. The report also claims this OS would rely on 3rd-party developers to create apps for it, which may shoot down the idea of Android apps being able to run on the OS.

According to the report, Huawei has been working on Project Z for several years, but its original intention was to be for their home Chinese market, and not a full Android replacement. If all of this is true, Huawei’s post-Android future may not be as positive as they’d like people to think.