Two sources told Reuters that China's Huawei has started talks with Russia on installing the Russian operating system "Aurora" on 360,000 of its smart boards that will be used in the census in Russia next year.
Huawei is looking for alternative operating systems to Google's Android operating system after Washington placed the world's second-largest smartphone maker on a list of so-called banned entities that threaten to cut off access to key components and technologies in the United States.
"This is a pilot project, we consider it the first stage of the launch of the Russian operating system on Huawei devices," the first source told Reuters.
A Huawei spokeswoman said the company was in talks with the Russian Ministry of Communications, but gave no further details.
Last week, the Chinese company said US trade restrictions could cut smartphone unit revenues by about $ 10 billion this year.
Russia is discussing the possibility of using the Aurora system on 360,000 smartphones from Huawei by August 2020.
The second source said that Huawei is interested in the project, and has offered samples of devices that can be used. The Aurora is the only operating system made in Russia and is not currently used.
Huawei is also developing its own operating system in preparation for the worst-case scenario of being stripped of Google's core Android apps.
Russian state telecommunications company Restelecom is the owner of the Aurora system, the only contractor to buy tablets for Russia's census in October, with an estimated population of 147 million.
"Various options for cooperation with Huawei are being considered with the participation of the Ministry of Communications. We cannot reveal details yet. There is agreement on the confidentiality of the talks," Rostelecom said in a written response to Reuters' request for comment.