Chinese tech giant Huawei on Tuesday unveiled their first smartphone equipped with a fully homegrown operating system, a key test in the firm’s fight to challenge the dominance of Western juggernauts.
Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android are currently used in the vast majority of mobile phones – but Huawei are looking to change that with their newest Mate 70 devices, which run on the company’s own HarmonyOS Next.
The launch caps a major turnaround in the fortunes of Huawei, which saw their wings badly clipped by gruelling US sanctions in recent years but have since bounced back with soaring sales.
And unlike their triple-folding phone, the Mate XT, priced at an eye-watering $2,800, which made it three times the cost of the newest iPhone, the Mate 70 has a much lower starting price of 5,499 yuan ($757.60). Pre-orders began on November 18 and over 3.34 million reservations were placed as of 06:00 PM on Tuesday, the Xinhua News Agency reported.
In any case, the risks remain high – unlike a previous iteration, based on Android’s open-source code, HarmonyOS Next requires a complete rewiring of all apps on the smartphones it powers.
“It is unclear whether developers overseas will be willing to spend the money needed to build a completely new version of their apps for the latest smartphones”, said Rich Bishop, co-founder and CEO of AppInChina, a publisher of international software in China.
“One third-party agency in China quoted a price of two million yuan ($275,500) to custom-fit a foreign app for HarmonyOS Next”, he told AFP.
To convince them, “Huawei need to continuously improve the software, provide better support for developers, and convince the developer community that (they are) committed to the long-term development of the Harmony ecosystem”, Paul Triolo, a partner at consulting firm Albright Stonebridge Group, told AFP.
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