Huawei hopes to offer Google apps in its own app store

Huawei hopes to offer Google apps in its AppGallery store, according to the company's rotating chairman Eric Xu. Huawei’s consumer business unit -- responsible for smartphones, laptops and other gadgets -- earned US$10 billion less in 2019 than the company’s target, largely due to a US blacklist that denies the company access to American tech like Google apps and services, Xu said at a press conference.

Xu compared the situation to Apple offering Google apps in the iOS App Store. But it's not entirely comparable, because many popular Android apps also rely on Google Play Services. Adding Google Maps to Huawei's store doesn't necessarily mean other apps will be able to use Google Maps, as many popular apps currently do on Google's Android. And it remains unclear how Huawei could offer Google apps on its own app store when it's not allowed to preload the search giant’s popular apps like Gmail, Google Maps, and YouTube on its phones.

The blacklist resulted in a challenging 2019 for Huawei, but it wasn’t all bad. The company’s annual report said it shipped 240 million Huawei and Honor smartphones, and shipment numbers from IDC and Strategy Analytics show it remained the world’s second-biggest smartphone brand. The flagship Mate and P series smartphones shipped more than 44 million units -- 53% more than the previous year. And despite missing its target, the consumer unit’s revenue still rose 34% to 467.3 billion yuan (US$65.9 billion).