The company sends beta version of the SDK to developers

Sep 18, 2020 06:16 GMT  ·  By

Due to the restrictions that the United States announced in mid-May 2019, Huawei is no longer allowed to use products, including software and hardware, developed by American firms.

And these obviously include Android, the Google mobile operating system that has until now powered Huawei smartphones released both in China and in international markets.

Because Huawei was no longer allowed to use Android on its devices, the company started the work on Harmony OS, its very own operating system that’s supposed to power more than smartphones.

According to a report from Digitimes, Harmony OS 2.0 is almost ready, so the company has recently shipped a beta version of the SDK to developers. The first stage is aimed at devices with large displays, wearables, and head-mounted units, while in December 2020, the SDK should also become available for smartphone developers.

Needless to say, the goal here is to give developers the opportunity to code for the platform, especially as Huawei hopes that more of them would bring their apps in the company’s own app store.

The struggle in international markets

Due to the restrictions, the Google Play Store wouldn’t be installed on Huawei phones either, so the Chinese firm hopes that by convincing developers to code for its devices, users wouldn’t feel the lack of apps when purchasing its smartphones.

The first phones running Harmony OS should go live in early 2021 if everything goes according to the plan, but it remains to be seen how this is going to work in international markets. Harmony OS is likely to be more successful in China, but on the other hand, most buyers in Europe would rather prefer the Android-powered experience that includes access to Google services.

Huawei, however, claims that over 96,000 apps are already in its store, which right now counts more than 4890 million active users.