China’s Huawei said on Saturday it is targeting 100,000 applications for its Harmony operating system in coming months as it seeks widespread help to achieve self-reliance.
The tech giant has more than 15,000 applications based on Harmony that can meet consumers’ basic needs, but the ecosystem requires more personalised and boutique apps, Huawei Chairman Xu Zhijun told a conference on Saturday.
Huawei unveiled Harmony in August 2019, after U.S. sanctions cut off support for Google’s (GOOGL.O). The Shenzhen-based company, which sells products ranging from smartphones to laptops, later developed an open-source version of the Harmony system.
Due to the US sanctions, “Huawei has been forced to accelerate developing its own operating system,” Xu said. Although much progress has been made, “for any operation system, no matter how advanced it is, it would be of no value if no one uses it.”
Xu expressed hope that developers could work hard to enrich app offerings and called on government agencies, state companies and social organisations to use Harmony as their operating system at work.
He asked consumers to be tolerant of the system’s immaturity, saying, “The more people use it, the more quickly it will become mature.”