NEW DELHI: Chinese handset makers Huawei and Oppo have started engaging with Indian developers to build localised mobile services that can be offered with their smartphones, wooing them with lucrative incentives under their global funds.
Charles Peng, CEO of Huawei and Honor India, consumer business group, told ET that Huawei’s sub-brand Honor is in talks with some 150 top mobile application makers in India to get them on its Huawei Media Services (HMS). “We have our own HMS and are trying to build a mobile ecosystem. Most of the key apps, such as navigation, payments, gaming and messaging will be ready by Decemberend,” he said.
Experts say the move is part of Huawei’s effort to build an alternative to Google’s service suite, called Google Media Services (GMS), since there is uncertainty on the use of GMS on Huawei and Honor mobile phones following restrictions announced by the US government earlier this year. GMS includes Gmail, YouTube, Navigation, Google Drive and Maps.
Huawei’s HMS will support smartphones that don’t have access to Google’s GMS. The executive said that Honor’s latest phone will come with Google services. “Consumers won’t see a difference between GMS and HMS. We are focusing on how to work with developers to offer a good customer experience. It is a challenge that we are trying to address,” he said.
“Huawei HQ is in touch with China developers and the India developer base will help us in India as well as regions like Europe. In every country, we will focus on bringing top 100-150 apps to customers through HMS,” Peng said.
Huawei, which has around a million registered developers globally for HMS, is offering an incentive of up to $17,000 on the integration of apps with HMS in India through its $1-billion global fund, which was announced this year to develop its own mobile services suite similar to that of Google. “We will create an end-toend business model with developers, content and service providers,” Peng said.
Oppo is allocating $143 million in 2020 for supporting developers across the globe, including India, to develop a “new intelligent service ecosystem” with developers and partners around its ColorOS operating system. “Oppo understands India as their key market and aims to reach out to the large talent pool of innovators, developers and partners,” the company said.
Tasleem Arif, Oppo India’s vicepresident of R&D, told ET that the company is looking for startups to incubate and develop services and applications that the Chinese handset maker could integrate with its Color OS 7. “There are a few startups that we have shortlisted and we believe these services, if you integrate into our platform, will lead to better user experience,” Arif said.
Navkender Singh, research director at IDC India, said that Huawei’s intent is good but their story breaks at the retail front. “There will be a breakdown of the conversation that Huawei or Honor devices will have OS and app store issue. It is going to be very tough for Huawei/Honor to sell the phone based on their own suite. They would need to double down on efforts for India,” he said.
Source: Economic Times
