Huawei Entices Developers To Join Its App Store By Offering Them Access To The Chinese Market

Aadhya Khatri - May 27, 2019

According to Bloomberg, Huawei is trying to convince developers to customize their apps to suit its app store, which has been around for years by offering them lots of benefits

According to Bloomberg, Huawei is trying to convince developers to customize their apps to suit its app store.

The virtual store in question has been around for years and is called App Gallery. Last year, the store was brought to other markets outside of China. As a result of the latest ban, the Chinese phone maker is putting more effort to develop App Gallery by negotiating with European wireless carriers to pre-install the store on newer devices. Huawei told its partners in Europe that the store would be ready to use for over 50 million users in Europe by the end of last year.

Huawei-App-Gallery — Huawei's App Gallery has been around for years

This store is increasingly vital to the company after the US ban that results in the restriction to access to Google’s Play Store for all Huawei’s device users. Even after the temporary ban lift, Huawei has to use the open-source version of Android, meaning that further apps and updates will be distributed by the company, not Google.

In March, Huawei announced that it was working on its own operating system to be a substitute for Android. The fact that it is accelerating the process of working with developers hints that Huawei is serious about a future when it no longer has access to Google's App Store. However, the ban also means that the Chines phone maker cannot work with Facebook, the company behind WhatsApp and Instagram, and even Epic Game, the firm that made Fortnite.

What Huawei can offer developers is the excellent processing power that its devices possess. The company also comes up with a tool to help them customize their apps to suit its own App Gallery. Another sweet deal is if developers decide to use its store, they will have access to the Chinese market where Google is banned.

It is believed that Huawei concentrates a lot of its effort in Europe. The company’s devices make up 23.3% of this market, as well as that of Africa and the Middle East.

The company’s operating system has been developing since 2012, and Huawei’s own OS will reportedly be launched by fall.