Xiaomi, Huawei, Oppo and Vivo will create their own rival Google Play

The trade war between the USA and China is entering a new round: the four largest Chinese vendors – Xiaomi, Huawei, Oppo and Vivo – are working on their own store for the Android platform.

According to Reuters, the platform will be created as part of the Global Developer Service Alliance (GDSA). Despite the lack of an official announcement, the alliance already has a website. It reports:

GDSA aims to create a universal set of services, including content distribution, developer support, marketing, brand promotion and monetization for all developers in the world. These services will help developers talk about themselves and get quality users.

It also notes that at the start the service will cover nine countries, including India, Indonesia, Russia and Malaysia. Initially, the platform was supposed to launch in March, but now, according to Reuters sources, its release may be postponed due to the situation with coronavirus.

Work on the platform is essentially a new step in the confrontation between the US and China.

At the beginning of last year, the United States Department of Commerce blacklisted Huawei.
Google was the first to respond to this: in the spring, it announced that all future Huawei devices would not have access to its services (including Google Play, Google Maps, Gmail, and so on).
In response, Huawei released in August its own Android operating system – Harmony OS, and in December announced that it was preparing an original mobile ecosystem that duplicates a similar one with Google.

• At the beginning of last year, the United States Department of Commerce blacklisted Huawei.
• Google was the first to respond to this: in the spring, it announced that all future Huawei devices would not have access to its services (including Google Play, Google Maps, Gmail, and so on).
• In response, Huawei released in August its own Android operating system – Harmony OS, and in December announced that it was preparing an original mobile ecosystem that duplicates a similar one with Google.

The formation of GDSA is seen as an initiative, participation in which will insure against possible future blocking of Xiaomi, Oppo and Vivo. It’s just not clear whether it is built on Huawei solutions or is a separate development.

According to IDC, together these companies in the fourth quarter of last year accounted for 40.1% of all smartphone sales.