Huawei To Create Google Services Alternative With Indian Developers, Startups

Faced with the uncertainty of incorporating Google Media Service (GMS) in their smartphones, Chinese handset manufacturer Huawei has now started to engage with Indian developers to build an alternative of Google’s offerings.

According to ET, Huawei is giving lucrative incentives to these developers from its global funds to create an alternative pool of Google’s services such as Gmail, YouTube, Navigation, Google Drive, and Maps. The Chinese mobile manufacturer has named its service as Huawei Media Service (HMS).

From its $1 Bn global funds, Huawei is currently offering an incentive of up to $17K to developers for the integration of their applications with HMS in India. For its global programme, Huawei has also partnered with over a million developers for its HMS project.

The recent move to bring new offerings to Indian users comes in the backdrop of restrictions imposed by the US government on Huawei earlier in 2019. Notably, the decision of the US government had posed an uncertainty on the use of some of Google’s services on Huawei manufactured smartphones.

Charles Peng, CEO of Huawei and Honor India, consumer business group, said that with HMS, the company is trying to build a mobile ecosystem. For the HMS project, Huawei’s mobile brand Honor is reportedly in discussion with developers of the top 150 apps in India and most of the important applications such as navigation, payments, gaming and messaging will be ready by end of this year.

On the speculation of whether Huawei’s new mobile devices will come without Google’s GMS, Peng clarified that users will get both GMS and HMS. “Consumers won’t see a difference between GMS and HMS,” he added.

As of now, Huawei is working with developers to improve the overall experience of its users. “It is a challenge that we are trying to address,” Peng noticed. Moreover, the Chinese company is also focusing on adding top 100-150 applications in every country through its HMS platform.

Explaining more about the HMS project, Peng said that the company is creating an end-to-end business model with developers, content and service providers. He further expects that the partnership will also allow developers in India to improve their market share as they will be offering their services to Huawei’s global customer base.

Moreover, Honor is also planning to go beyond smartphones and enter markets such as smart TVs, smart audio devices and other IoT devices in India.

While the sales of Honor smartphones have gone drastically down in May 2019 in India, the company is expecting a 10% market share by 2020.

Oppo Not Behind In The Race

Another mobile manufacturer, Oppo, which has made a mark in India with its camera focussed smartphones, decided to invest around $143 Mn in 2020 to support developers across the globe. With these investments, Oppo is planning to develop a new intelligent service ecosystem based on its operating system, ColorOS.

Moreover, Oppo is also planning to incubate Indian startups which will help them to develop services and applications for integration with Color OS 7. As of now, Oppo has shortlisted some startups for its incubation programme. The recently launched Color OS 7 also comes with an integration of the DigiLocker, a government developed data security app, among other security features.

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