huawei p10 smartphone

A hostess holds Huawei’s new P10 Plus device after its presentation ceremony at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Pic: Reuters

Huawei might be first to make blockchain-ready smartphones mainstream

CHINA’S biggest smartphone maker, Huawei Technologies Ltd., is looking to develop a mobile phone that could run blockchain-based applications, a report said.

Bloomberg quoted sources as saying the Shenzen-based company was in talks to license Sirin Labs’ operating system, called SIRIN OS, to run blockchain applications alongside Alphabet Inc.’s Android system.

The people who asked not to be named due to the private nature of the proposal said the talks on the matter were preliminary and no agreement have been signed.

However, representatives of Huawei and Sirin Labs confirmed the companies have met but declined to disclose any details of the talks. The people close to the matter said the executives from both companies have met over the past two months.

“Amazing meeting just concluded between Sirin Labs and Huawei. Among other things discussed was the possibility of cooperating together to bring blockchain technology to the masses in a secure way,” A caption under a Feb. 28 picture on Sirin Labs’ Telegram chat group sighted by Bloomberg reads.

huawei beijing

Huawei has previously been ranked as the most authentic brand in China, where it’s dominating the smartphone market. Pic: AP

If it takes off, the project would mark the first time a major smartphone maker will be integrating blockchain into one of its products for the mass market.

The report also said Sirin Labs is also working to develop its own blockchain-based smartphone which is tipped to be released by the end of the year. So far, the company has received pre-orders for 25,000 units.

The Sirin Labs phone will embed a cold storage crypto-wallet and a system that allows fiat money to be automatically converted into digital tokens needed to run other blockchain-based apps.

The cold storage wallets also allow digital assets offline.

Huawei is the world’s third-largest smartphone maker with leading positions in telecommunications gear, cloud computing, cloud security and aviation systems.