This archive report was first published on 9 August 2019.
On August 9, 2019, Chinese telecom giant Huawei unveiled its own operating system, HarmonyOS, in response to the threat of losing access to Android systems amid escalating US-China trade tensions.
Richard Yu, the head of Huawei's consumer business, described the new system as "future-oriented" and "completely different from Android and iOS." The system is designed to be "more smooth and secure," according to Yu.
HarmonyOS is considered crucial for Huawei's survival as the company confronts a looming White House ban on US companies selling technology products to Huawei, which could remove its access to Google's Android operating system.
"If you're asking when will we apply this to the smartphone, we can do it at any time," said Yu, adding that they gave priority to using Google's Android operating system, which is compatible with Harmony.
However, if Huawei cannot use Android in the future, it can immediately switch to the Harmony OS, according to Yu.
Huawei has been working on its own operating system since 2012, but the group has always said publicly it didn't want to replace its Android phones with a home operating system.
"Creating our own operating system was 'Plan B',
