4 ms·

I always wondered what would it take for a company to develop an alternative mobile operating system? To me the combination of Android and iOS always was the p

by chvid 7y ago

I always wondered what would it take for a company to develop an alternative mobile operating system? To me the combination of Android and iOS always was the perfect mold around the business of high-end mobile phones. Android is given away for free; but to make a truly great end user experience hardware and software needs to be integrated. Like it is for iOS. But that requires an enourmous investment; and there is no "natural" piecemeal way to grow there as your business always would be competing with peers that use the "free" platform. But this gives Huawei, a massive and capable engineering company, no choice but to build an alternative. This is an extreme situation; but hopefully there will come some true innovation out of it.

stoppergoo 7y ago
At this point I speculate a lot are on iOS to avoid android, and vice versa. Any offering that hwei makes will surely not move the needle from either camp, but it’s good to see some new competition
- chvid 7y ago
  If this escalation is continued; Apple will likely loose access to the Chinese market creating a huge open space for a high-end mobile phone offering.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
chvid 7y ago
But it is also worth noting the ZTE story which ended with ZTE paying a 1B "fine": https://www.androidauthority.com/zte-reportedly-will-pay-us-up-to-1-7-billion-to-lift-hardware-parts-ban-872958/ https://www.androidauthority.com/zte-reportedly-will-pay-us-...
mrtksn 7y ago
Microsoft tried hard to have a mobile operating system, there were others too but the problem is that nobody cares for the operating system if there is no viable ecosystem around it.
- GordonS 7y ago
  And Microsoft's mobile OS was actually good - many lamented its demise. Didn't Samsung also create a new mobile OS in recent times? I wonder how that's doing now?
0815test 7y ago
There were lots of "alternative" mobile OS's before AOSP, and even before iOS - AOSP simply got critical mass behind it in a way that other OS's didn't. But Huawei isn't going to push for an open alternative either - even their versions of AOSP have always been among the most closed and hardest to "mod". As far as openness goes, Purism/Librem, and the pmOS community project remain our best bets.
tgsovlerkhgsel 7y ago
> I always wondered what would it take for a company to develop an alternative mobile operating system? Creating an app ecosystem out of nowhere. This was the same thing that killed all competitors to Apple and Android.
iamnothere 7y ago
Sailfish, Tizen, and KaiOS exist, and there are some other Linux-based alternatives out there as well. Unfortunately none of these have good market share yet. I don't know much about the business side of mobile OS development, but it must be difficult to gain and keep market share if even MS couldn't succeed.

by chvid 7y ago

stoppergoo 7y ago

At this point I speculate a lot are on iOS to avoid android, and vice versa. Any offering that hwei makes will surely not move the needle from either camp, but it’s good to see some new competition

chvid 7y ago
If this escalation is continued; Apple will likely loose access to the Chinese market creating a huge open space for a high-end mobile phone offering.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]

chvid 7y ago

But it is also worth noting the ZTE story which ended with ZTE paying a 1B "fine": https://www.androidauthority.com/zte-reportedly-will-pay-us-up-to-1-7-billion-to-lift-hardware-parts-ban-872958/ https://www.androidauthority.com/zte-reportedly-will-pay-us-...

mrtksn 7y ago

Microsoft tried hard to have a mobile operating system, there were others too but the problem is that nobody cares for the operating system if there is no viable ecosystem around it.

GordonS 7y ago
And Microsoft's mobile OS was actually good - many lamented its demise. Didn't Samsung also create a new mobile OS in recent times? I wonder how that's doing now?

0815test 7y ago

There were lots of "alternative" mobile OS's before AOSP, and even before iOS - AOSP simply got critical mass behind it in a way that other OS's didn't. But Huawei isn't going to push for an open alternative either - even their versions of AOSP have always been among the most closed and hardest to "mod". As far as openness goes, Purism/Librem, and the pmOS community project remain our best bets.

tgsovlerkhgsel 7y ago

> I always wondered what would it take for a company to develop an alternative mobile operating system? Creating an app ecosystem out of nowhere. This was the same thing that killed all competitors to Apple and Android.

iamnothere 7y ago

Sailfish, Tizen, and KaiOS exist, and there are some other Linux-based alternatives out there as well. Unfortunately none of these have good market share yet. I don't know much about the business side of mobile OS development, but it must be difficult to gain and keep market share if even MS couldn't succeed.