Why the duopoly no longer fits Europe
For over a decade, mobile computing has been dominated by two primary operating systems. That stability has delivered scale, but it has also concentrated power, limited strategic options, and created a structural dependency that is increasingly at odds with Europe’s priorities. At the same time, new device categories, from wearables and smart home devices to industrial and vehicle systems, demand operating systems that can extend beyond phones while staying aligned with strict privacy, security, and compliance requirements. Europe’s regulatory leadership (for example, on data protection and digital market rules) reinforces the need for platforms that are open, inspectable, and locally accountable. An open source, modular operating system with European governance addresses all three: strategic independence, multi-device reach, and regulatory compliance.
Europe is many markets, one ambition
European users speak dozens of languages, navigate diverse cultural expectations, and often rely on country‑specific apps for payments, identity, public services, mobility, and healthcare. For developers and product teams, this is both a challenge and a catalyst for innovation. Any new operating system seeking adoption in Europe must be “local‑friendly” from the outset. This diversity also drives a pragmatic mindset. Companies want to ship fast, meet local requirements, and still be able to scale across borders. That makes cross‑platform frameworks, back‑end portability, and standards‑based integration key ingredients.
From OpenHarmony to Oniro
OpenHarmony emerged as a new contender in the OS space, designed from the start for a world of interconnected devices. Oniro is the European distribution and community initiative built on top of OpenHarmony. It is hosted by the Eclipse Foundation, which brings decades of experience in open governance, IP management, and industrial‑grade open source stewardship.
Crucially, two open source foundations, the OpenAtom Foundation in China and the Eclipse Foundation in Europe, have established a formal partnership to collaborate on technology and ecosystem development. It is a structured collaboration intended to grow a global ecosystem while ensuring that Europe’s needs are addressed locally. Oniro focuses on the European region, locally grown innovation and rich developer experience while retaining compatibility with OpenHarmony to benefit from upstream momentum and device reach.
The dual‑foundation model is a first of its kind at this level of detail. It allows contributions, governance, and compliance processes to reflect regional requirements while sharing code and learnings across the globe. In practice, this means shared technology and compatibility, European governance and compliance, and local‑friendly ecosystem building. This approach balances global scale with regional trust.
What earlier alternative OS attempts taught us
History is rich with bold attempts to break the mobile duopoly. Many failed not because they lacked vision, but because they misread the adoption cliff. Typical pitfalls included wrong timing, narrow positioning, hardware gaps but the most importantly app deficit. No matter how advanced a platform is, adoption follows apps. For end users, “Does it run my essentials?” is the only question that matters. For developers, the bar is equally high: modern tooling, clear docs, working SDKs, predictable APIs, and fast feedback loops. Oniro’s strategy acknowledges that the fastest route to app availability is to meet developers where they are. That means prioritizing mainstream languages, welcoming popular cross‑platform frameworks, and making it easy to port or ship new apps.
A credible open source alternative cannot rely on ideology alone, it must reduce total cost and risk for teams. Practical levers include familiar tools, clear portability paths, a trustworthy IP compliance toolchain, device diversity with reference designs and community velocity. In the current era one cannot forget about AI‑assisted development tools that can substantially reduce time‑to‑market. When combined with strong SDKs and cross‑platform options, teams have a credible path to ship quickly on Oniro while preserving high quality. However, there is no silver bullet for app development strategy. Cross‑platform frameworks and native development each have strengths. A pragmatic model for Oniro recognises both, requirements for balancing performance and UX, time to market and cost of development, availability of developers with proper skills.
AI agents are not here, yet
There is widespread speculation that “AI agents” will disrupt the app model by mediating user intent and invoking capabilities across services. That may happen, but it is not the present reality. Today, users still expect app storefronts, icons, and predictable UX flows. Oniro’s stance is pragmatic: build the foundations for excellent apps now, adopt AI tooling to speed development, improve accessibility, and stay ready to integrate agentic patterns when they mature.
In the meantime, AI can already accelerate development through code generation, test synthesis, and localisation assistance. Teams that combine AI‑assisted workflows with Oniro’s cross‑platform options will see faster iteration cycles and lower costs.
Cross‑platform development frameworks
Developer familiarity matters. React Native is already widely used across the globe, including Europe, and the framework has been selected as one of the first for ecosystem integration. The integration has been done by Oniro WG member Software Mansion. Hundreds of apps built with React Native have already been made available for the Oniro/OpenHarmony ecosystem, with momentum increasing. For teams this means a shorter learning curve and a faster delivery. With Oniro’s focus on compatibility and developer experience, React Native provides a compelling bridge for web‑adjacent teams to target phones, tablets, and other form factors.
Kotlin Multiplatform (KMP) and Flutter are other important frameworks. They align well with Europe’s preference for rapid development, testability, and long-term maintainability of applications. For organisations looking to hedge risk, they offer a path to deliver solutions on multiple platforms without committing to a wholesale rewrite. Many European teams already use them extensively, and a multitude of European top downloaded apps have been created using these frameworks. The Oniro community is actively researching a way to make these frameworks available.
Rust is knocking on many doors
Rust’s momentum matters for Oniro because it combines performance with memory safety and modern tooling. Although Rust is perceived as a language for development of lower system layers, its instantly growing popularity turned many eyes toward mobile app development. It results in a growing set of frameworks that turn Rust into a practical, multi‑platform app stack with examples like Tauri, Robius and Dioxus. To indicate growing popularity of these is enough to say that Tauri has already gathered almost 100k stars on GitHub.
Call to action
Europe needs an open, interoperable, and locally accountable mobile operating system that can thrive across devices and markets. Oniro, built on OpenHarmony and governed through the Eclipse Foundation, is that path. It is not a promise of overnight disruption, it is a durable, developer‑first strategy to broaden choice, accelerate innovation, and align with Europe’s values.
If you want to help Europe move beyond the duopoly, join the Oniro community. The door is open and the ecosystem is ready to grow.
Think global. Code local.
About the Author
Jarosław Marek
Dr. Jarosław “Jarek” Marek is Chair of the Eclipse Oniro Steering Committee and a co-founder of the project. He bridges ecosystem collaboration, developer engagement, and technical strategy across Europe. His career spans large-scale deployments of Bada, Android, and Tizen across European markets.