Huawei is set to unveil its new Mate 30 line of phones on Sept. 18 in Munich, though it is not clear when the devices will go on sale. What appears to be clear is that the devices will not be shipping with key Google apps and services.
A Google spokesman told Reuters the Mate 30 cannot be sold with licensed Google apps and services due to the U.S. ban on sales to Huawei. A temporary reprieve that the U.S. government announced last week does not apply to new products such as the Mate 30, the spokesman said.
Speaking to Reuters, a spokesperson for Huawei said the company would “continue to use the Android OS and ecosystem if the US Government allows us to do so […] otherwise, we will continue to develop our own”.
Simply put, the Mate 30 and Mate 30 Pro won’t be allowed to run the full version of Android. Instead, they’ll either have to run a completely new operating system or Android Open Source Project (AOSP), a restricted version of Android that doesn’t offer access to many of the apps Android users rely on on a daily basis.
Google apps that AOSP doesn’t include are Google Play Store, Google Assistant, Gmail, Google Photos, Google Maps, Google Drive, Google Duo and YouTube.
The ban hasn’t affected current Huawei smartphones and devices. Google has said the Google Play Store, the Android app store and the security features which come with Android, will continue to be available on existing Huawei devices.
That means anything from the recent Huawei P30 range release, the Huawei Mate 20 X 5G, and previous device are all fine.
Huawei has been developing its own operating system for some time now, with HarmonyOS becoming official in early August, but it would take considerable effort for this alternative to reach the same level of the Google ecosystem.
