With HarmonyOS NEXT, Huawei has achieved something incredible. Neither Samsung, nor Microsoft, nor Mozilla have achieved this.

On May 19, 2019, Google announced a ban on Huawei. The company couldn’t continue to offer Google services and apps on its upcoming phones, and that left many of us thinking the same thing.

Huawei seemed doomed.

The veto, part of a series of measures in the trade war between the United States and China, was a missile that struck its mobile business. At the time, Huawei was on track to catch up and surpass Apple and Samsung in global smartphone sales, but the blow seemed fatal.

Sales have plummeted even in its home country of China. There were few escape routes, but little by little the company, which did not give up, took steps that led to something impressive. Huawei has risen from the ashesand the company achieved this by overcoming a Western veto that had made the future of its mobile business extremely difficult.

There was a key factor in its favor: China. The Asian giant has become the absolute powerhouse of Huawei’s smartphone business, and government support has been coupled with notable strategic decisions that have always aimed at the same thing: relying solely on themselves.

This strategy reminds me of Applewhich in recent years has demonstrated its obsession with total control over its products in both software and hardware. The Cupertino-based company eliminates external dependencies on its mobile phones and computers, and this has allowed it to have absolute control over its ecosystem.

Never see you again, Android

Huawei seems to have reached the same milestone, and one of the key moments was the launch of HarmonyOS NEXT. This operating system is a development of HarmonyOS, which in preview versions was still based on AOSP, an open source version of Android that anyone can use… but which does not include Google services and applications (including Gmail, YouTube, Maps or the play store ).

However HarmonyOS NEXT is an operating system created from the ground up.100% proprietary and will eventually be adopted by the entire Huawei device ecosystem. Not only mobile phones, but also tablets, smart watches and even headphones.

HarmonyOS Next is not compatible with Android apps. Instead, it uses executable files compiled specifically for this platform and also using the so-called Huawei Mobile Services (HMS). The number of applications is very modest at the moment (15,000), but if all goes as it seems, this number will grow rapidly in the coming months.

This will be facilitated by the fact that China is a lot of China. The Asian giant appears to have welcomed the revamped Huawei with open arms, with its market share in the country rising from 4% to 17% in just one year. It even surpassed Apple.

High demand for its devices will likely force developers to also switch to a new operating systemand it will be interesting to see if Western software companies and companies will give in and release their products for HarmonyOS NEXT and its ecosystem. The first terminals prepared to use this operating system have just been released: the foldable devices Huawei Mate 70 and Mate X6 have generated great expectations.

Neither Microsoft nor Samsung succeeded

Huawei has managed to do something that no other company has been able to do in recent years. The Apple-Google duopoly in the mobile industry has managed to dominate this market, but it is true that there have been attempts to change the situation in the past.

There are several examples, but the most notable ones are definitely those of Microsoft with Windows Phone and Samsung with Tizen. In the end, they both gave up.but others have done the same, such as Ubuntu, Sailfish or Firefox OS. Attempts to offer options have always been bright, but time after time they hit the same wall: the inertia of iOS and Android was too strong.

Neither Microsoft, nor Samsung, nor the rest offered anything significantly better, and the maturity of these ecosystems led to the fact that both users and developers created a vicious circle: applications were on Android and iOS because users were there, and vice versa. It was too difficult to compete in such a situation.

But with HarmonyOS NEXT, such inertia does not exist. Google assumed this veto power. It is true that many manufacturers in China continue to rely on Android terminals, but Huawei’s success opens up a unique future for the world of mobility, especially there.

It’s unknown whether Huawei will try to break its borders with this operating system, but it certainly seems like a smart move. For now, they continue to base their terminals – even modern ones – on EMUI, but it will be interesting to see what the company decides in this regard.

For now, one thing is clear: the launch of HarmonyOS NEXT. marks a turning point in the mobility segment. He’s already doing this in China: let’s see if he does the same in the rest of the world.

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