Everything changes for Android
Whisper it quietly – Android could go towards something a nightmare, even a disaster. After the tumult of losing Huawei to American sanctions, which encouraged what was once the main Android OEM to follow his own path, it could be the beginning of something worse. It would be a setback for Google. But for Samsung, it’s time for the decision.
Huawei’s news was bad enough for Android. I warned at the time of the initial sanctions in the process of stripping Google of the Huawei phones that it risked China alone, bad news for us. We have five years later and the harmony of the Huawei operating system allowed their Android phones to hunt Vivo for first place in the vast Chinese market.
But now Vivo, the China market leader, his fourth Oppo, and Xiaomi, the third largest manufacturer of phones sold globallyMay have a unpleasant surprise for the Android ecosystem. As Xiaomitime Explain: “There have been rumors in the technological space of a collaboration between three Chinese technology players – Xiaomi, BBK Group (Oppo mother company, Vivo and OnePlus) and Huawei – to launch an Android alternative without Google.”
This decision would leave Samsung as the Only the best -selling brand Always running Android. Huawei was once up there and already left. Xiaomi, Vivo and Oppo are the others. By Gsmarena“While Huawei has lost its world domination, Xiaomi, Vivo and Oppo are in the top 5 around the world, so if they start to sell phones without Google, it would have a major impact on the market.” To put it more and more, it would change the situation for Android.
And it’s not just Google and Android in the reticle. Last week, the Morning post in southern China reported on “Huawei reveals [its] First laptop in progress [its] Harmonyos self-developed as [its] The Windows license expires … The laptop, which has not yet been named, operates Harmonyos 5, also called Harmonyos, the last iteration of the system. Most Huawei laptops on the market are currently running windows. “”
On the smartphone side, Samsung is already Android’s first OEM, although Huawei pursues it hard for first place (and occasionally won) before the sanctions settled. If the other largest brands in China also abandon, Samsung would be the only great Android player other than Google himself, still in the ecosystem.
Separately in this emerging China story, Samsung is already suffering from his need to follow the example of Google on each turn, the pixels always coming first. We have seen this with Android 15 and the long delays of Samsung, we now see it with the beta version of Android 16 and the probable deployment calendar, and we see it every month – including this month, when the security versions go much more effectively to the pixels than for anyone.
If – and it is a big if for the moment – the other main Chinese OEMs collaborate around a common operating system, with the advanced Android alternative from Huawei as a starter, Samsung will have the possibility of redefining Android and its relationship with Google. It can always take applications and AI, but it would be an opportunity to create an ecosystem more closely resembling apples and Google than today.
Google’s optics compete with Samsung and other OEMs while providing their central operating system has always been annoying, and the fact that Pixel is advancing. Maybe this kind of change was always inevitable. Admittedly, the idea that Chinese OEMs were forever indebted to operating systems were fanciful to us. And this change leaves Samsung behind. It is difficult to think of a worst Android nightmare for Google that its best OEMs collaborating on something new.
This nightmare can now be realized.
