SINGAPORE and MANILA, Philippines, Sept. 14, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Huawei Consumer Business Group held its annual Huawei Developer Conference (HDC) 2020 themed "HDC - Together" from 10 to 12 September 2020 in Songshan Lake, Dongguan to announce the technical upgrades and development progress of Huawei Mobile Services (HMS) ecosystem. During the 'Grow with HMS Best Practices' virtual global tech session, five app partners from Asia-Pacific (APAC) were invited to present key milestones that they've achieved in collaboration with Huawei towards building a "Seamless AI Life".
The HMS ecosystem has achieved rapid growth globally. As of September, there are 1.8 million registered Huawei Developers worldwide to continuously create apps through HMS open capabilities. Since its global launch in April 2018, the HUAWEI AppGallery has now successfully attracted 490 million monthly users across 170 countries, and achieved 261 billion app downloads within the first eight months of this year.
Co-marketing to promote app growth
In growing the ecosystem, HMS have supported partners by tailoring the co-marketing campaign based on the app's unique selling points and local preferences.
In the Philippines, HMS collaborated with Kumu livestreaming app to launch the "Mother's Day"-themed campaign in May. The mechanics entailed viewers to purchase virtual Huawei products such as HUAWEI P40 and smartwatch through Kumu's livestreams and send them as gifts to support their favourite live streamers' leaderboard standings.
The livestream videos broadcasted under this campaign had successfully reached more than 1 million users. After the two-week campaign, Kumu's paid users increased by 220%, and in-app purchases grew by 40 times.
"The overwhelming co-marketing results were attributed to HUAWEI AppGallery's full-funnel marketing support and campaign mechanic specially tailored based on Kumu's unique selling point," said James Rumohr, Chief of Staff and Head of Community of Kumu Philippines.
Effortless and simple HMS integration experience
Early this year, Huawei have set up technical teams in key APAC markets to assist app developers on the HMS app integration process. In Thailand, Wongnai and LINE MAN have integrated with HMS Core kits to be part of the HUAWEI ecosystem.
Established since 2010, Wongnai is one of the leading lifestyle apps focusing on the food and beverage industry and it owns the largest restaurant database in Thailand.
HUAWEI smartphone users are accounted for the second-largest of Wongnai Android users. The app took three weeks to integrate with HMS Core Kits and launched onto the HUAWEI AppGallery in March.
"From the technical perspective, HMS open capabilities covered all the functionalities that Wongnai needed. We've integrated with HMS Map Kit, Location Kit, and Site Kit. The integration was simple and easy, as the class and method of HMS APIs and SDKs are similar to the other mobile services, which eased the code conversion," said Pattrawoot, Chief Technology Officer of Wongnai Thailand.
On the other hand, LINE MAN, the on-demand delivery service app covering taxi-hailing, messenger, parcel delivery and more, was newly onboarded into the HUAWEI AppGallery in June.
The location-focused app decided to first integrate with HMS Map Kit and Location Kit. To ease the future app maintenance, LINE MAN also added a set of logic APIs into the app, to make it run smoothly on HMS devices and other mobile services.
"We have added a set of logic into our app to make it compatible with HMS and other mobile services. With these APIs, our app would first check if the current device is running on HMS or other mobile services, and then determine which type of Map to be displayed to users," said Xinming Zhao, the COO of LINE MAN.
Zhao added that, with this function, all the codes and APIs required for an app to run on HMS and other mobile services are packaged into one APK, which helps to save time on in-app testing and maintenance.
Hybrid, multi-platform distribution solutions
HMS also provides hybrid, multi-platform distribution across the ecosystem for its partners to reach out to a larger user pool.
Star Media Group (SMG), a multi-channel media group based in Malaysia, onboarded all of its six applications including The Star, Star ePaper, Star Property, Kuali, 988, and Dimsum Entertainment into the HUAWEI AppGallery in October 2019. Additionally, SMG had also connected to 'Huawei Ability Gallery' (HAG) capabilities to make its content services available through HUAWEI Video and HUAWEI Assistant∙TODAY.
"These capabilities opened up multiple touchpoints for our content across the HMS products. For example, the HUAWEI Video app is a new platform for us to promote our subscription video-on-demand, Dimsum Entertainment; while HAG services help increase the visibility of our content and increase user interaction by featuring our content on HUAWEI Assistant∙TODAY. This collaboration has resulted in over 410,000 apps downloaded and average monthly video views growth of 704% within 6 months," said Lam Swee Kim, Chief Marketing Officer of Star Media Group.
SMG also newly implemented the HUAWEI Ad kit in their applications to start monetizing the in-app traffic.
Future Outlook on HUAWEI Ads
HUAWEI Ads enable app developers to monetize the in-app traffic by placing advertisement in their apps, and allow advertisers to tap into Huawei device's broad user base. Huawei has been actively engaging with the GroupM advertising group to pilot the HUAWEI Ad service to spearhead it in the Malaysia market.
"We believe that 5G technology can further transform the mobile ad experience; and this is where Huawei has a significant advantage over its competitors. With 5G, issues such as lagging and latency can be easily resolved. Additionally, higher data speed, improved geo-capabilities, and better sensors will also enhance the location targeting services," said Law Chan Keong, Chief Investment Officer of GroupM Malaysia.
To watch the full video, please visit: https://developer.huawei.com/consumer/en/events/hdc2020/
Photo - https://photos.prnasia.com/prnh/20200911/2914404-1?lang=0
