Huawei Mate 30 May Launch Without Licensed Android

The Huawei Mate 30 will be revealed on September 18 in Munich, with or without a Google-licensed version of Android onboard. Comments from anonymously-sourced officials from Huawei and Google suggest the next major smartphone from Huawei may be a landmark release. Sources familiar with the matter suggest that the event will go on as scheduled, but did not specify when the phone would go on sale.

The timing for the sale of this phone is key. A Google spokesperson spoke with Reuters this week suggesting that the Huawei Mate 30 "cannot be sold with the licensed version of Android" from Google thanks to the US Government's trade war with China*. This means that the phone would not be allowed to launch with the Google Play app store or any of the variety of Google-made apps and services.

*SEE HERE: How Huawei's coped with the US ban so far

However, as Android is an open source software, Huawei could go on to take the Amazon route. They could produce a fork of Android and continue to sell devices with access to alternate app stores. Then again, as contracts with the Open Handset Alliance stipulate, no OHA member may produce handsets based on Android forks.

Imagine, instead, a Huawei device working with AOSP – the Android Open Source Project, super basic version of Android, with Huawei's launcher on top. That won't likely be what the Huawei Mate 30 presents – but we shall see.

"Huawei will continue to use the Android OS and ecosystem if the U.S. government allows us to do so," said Huawei spokesman Joe Kelly. "Otherwise, we will continue to develop our own operating system and ecosystem."

Meanwhile rumors abound that Huawei has their own relatively inexpensive smartphone ready to roll with their own Huawei OS: ARK. Huawei's suggested several times that their ARK OS is not made for consumer devices and that they remain committed to using Android, but circumstances can change, and drastic times can mean Huawei takes drastic measures.