Author: Zhou Yuan / Wall Street See

Information from multiple channels shows that the official version of HarmonyOS NEXT will be released at the end of September. Chen Xinxin, General Manager of Huawei Hongmong Industry Solutions, confirmed this news at the 2024 China International Service Trade Fair.

The reason why HarmonyOS NEXT has attracted high market attention is that it is the third largest IoT operating system besides Android and iOS. Based on Huawei's self-developed full-stack system foundation, HarmonyOS NEXT is also a domestically controlled independent IoT system in China.

Yu Chengdong, Huawei's Executive Director, Chairman of the Terminal BG, and Chairman of the Smart Automobile Solutions BU, stated that HarmonyOS NEXT can achieve a 30% improvement in overall performance and a 20% reduction in power consumption.

According to insiders who participated in the testing of HarmonyOS NEXT, the smoothness of HarmonyOS NEXT can be described as silky. Currently, HarmonyOS NEXT has basically covered mainstream daily applications, including popular national demand applications such as WeChat and WPS (adaptation completed on September 14).

HarmonyOS NEXT is called the "pure-blood version", mainly because this new domestic independent operating system abandons the Linux kernel and traditional AOSP code, and only supports the Hongmong kernel and Hongmong system applications, so it is not compatible with the original Android system.

The so-called AOSP code refers to the source code of the Android Open Source Project (AOSP).

This is an open-source project led by Google that provides the core source code of the Android operating system. Anyone can download and use the AOSP code to create custom versions of Android-based operating systems.

The design purpose of AOSP is to avoid any single industry participant from limiting or controlling the innovation of other participants, ensuring that the source code is open and available for customization and portability.

The AOSP code includes various components required to build the Android operating system, such as the kernel, hardware abstraction layer (HAL), Android runtime environment, core libraries, and some core applications. While anyone can use the Android source code for any purpose, device manufacturers must participate in the Android Compatibility Program to be part of the shared app ecosystem built around Android.

The AOSP code is the foundation of the Android operating system, allowing for extensive customization and innovation while ensuring compatibility and consistency among Android devices.

Therefore, by abandoning the AOSP code, HarmonyOS NEXT means that this system is completely independent of the Android operating system and belongs to a brand new technical framework. For example, HarmonyOS NEXT adopts Huawei's self-developed Star-Shield security architecture and builds a new security system and order based on the synergy of software and hardware and the Hongmeng kernel.

Currently, HarmonyOS NEXT is known to be used in different types of terminals such as Huawei smartphones, pads, laptops, smart screens, and foldable screens.

Among them, this new system will be used in Huawei's newly launched foldable model, Huawei Mate XT, including the upcoming Huawei Mate 70 series.

A piece of news on September 14 caught the attention of Wall Street News: Kingsoft Office announced that its office software suite WPS has completed the development adaptation for HarmonyOS NEXT.

Kingsoft Office announced that WPS has completed the development of the native version for HongMengOS. It has made product adaptations for different screen sizes, such as mobile phones, foldable screens, and tablets, and achieved cross-platform and cross-device document and data sharing based on unified multi-platform accounts. It supports multi-user collaboration, browsing, editing and revision capabilities.

In other words, WPS HongMeng native applications are running smoothly on all platforms, and WPS AI has also launched on multiple platforms, migrating dozens of AI functions to HarmonyOS NEXT.

The biggest scenario demand for foldable screens actually comes from mobile lightweight office applications. Huawei Mate XT, as a new foldable category, has an unfolded size of nearly 10 inches, close to the actual size of a tablet. If the lightweight office experience of the three foldable screen models can be improved to be on par with that of laptops, the demand for such terminal forms will be ignited.

"Since foldable models have solved the problem of weight and battery life, I hardly use laptops when I travel," said the market research director of an investment company to Wall Street Eye, "If Mate XT can achieve a similar adaptive experience with office software as laptops, then I will definitely not bring heavy and poor battery life laptops when I travel."

Does the high inventory of 1 million Huawei Mate XT devices come from Huawei's high confidence in improving lightweight office software on HarmonyOS NEXT?

As of May 2024, there are already more than 0.9 billion HarmonyOS ecosystem devices, with 2.54 million developers and a monthly call volume of 82.7 billion for application development services. The HarmonyOS NEXT operating system brings together more than 5,000 apps in the ecosystem, of which more than 1,500 apps have been listed.

It can be said that the ecological starting point of HarmonyOS NEXT is quite high. Based on China's strong push for the overall security of the consumer electronics industry, the prospect of HarmonyOS NEXT's ecological construction in China is undoubtedly foreseeable. In the near future, in the Chinese market, HarmonyOS NEXT will have the ability to confront Android and iOS operating systems head-on.