Huawei has applied to trademark the “Hongmeng” operating system in nine countries, including Mexico, Canada, South Korea, New Zealand and Cambodia. Heng Chivoan
China's Huawei Technologies Co has applied to trademark the “Hongmeng” operating system (OS) in a number of countries including Cambodia in a bid to launch its homegrown operating system as a replacement for the Android OS, Reuters has reported.
Huawei has applied to trademark the “Hongmeng” operating system in nine countries, including Mexico, Canada, South Korea, New Zealand and Cambodia.
The move comes after Huawei was banned from doing business with US tech companies by the Trump administration last month.
A Huawei representative in Cambodia said on Sunday that it could not comment yet on the trademark filing as the green light to publicly share the information has not been given.
The representative told The Post: “About the OS, we have a plan to reveal it. But we cannot disclose anything about it locally yet. What I can confirm is that the [Hongmeng] OS will be compatible with Android apps. We will make a separate announcement locally when we are ready.”
Cambodia is one of the main markets for Huawei products in Southeast Asia, the representative added.
The Huawei brand is popular for its competitive price, its quality and compatibility with the same products its competitors provide on the market, he said.
The Department of Intellectual Property Rights database said Huawei Technologies filed for the registration of the Hongmeng OS trademark on May 30. The application was submitted by LPN IP, an accredited trademark agency in Cambodia.
Op Rady, the director of the Department of Intellectual Property Rights at the Ministry of Commerce, confirmed Huawei Technologies’ application.
“The process to complete all the trademark formalities is from six to nine months after the submission date,” he said.
Andrew Williamson, vice-president of public affairs and communications at Huawei, told Reuters in an interview last week in Mexico that “Huawei is in the process of potentially launching a replacement” for the Android OS.
He said the Hongmeng OS would be ready to go “in months” should trade tensions between the US and China escalate.
In April, Cambodia signed a memorandum of understanding with Huawei Technologies to build a fifth-generation (5G) network, making it the first Asean country to do so.
