Chinese search company Baidu is working on an Android clone. Baidu has already created a Twitter-like application for the Chinese market, and such a practice is not uncommon among Chinese firms.
According to everythingandroid Baidu, a company listed on the New York stock exchange had been growing very fast, and is perfectly capable of developing a mobile operating system. It is indeed developing its own mobile operating system which is similar to Android.
The new OS will not be an overlay, like HTC Sense or Samsung touchwhiz, which are user interfaces sitting on top of Android. What Baidu is purportedly working on is a clone of Android, to be marketed against Android in China under the name Qiushi.
Android itself is built using Linux, an open source operating system, but that has been done legally. What Baidu is apparently doing can be challenged as an intellectual property violation.
However, Baidu can avert that situation but changing bits a pieces and claiming to have built its OS on Linux.
If indeed this new OS is built, it is likely that it will find its way into India, as the Indian market is flooded with Chinese phones, marketed by Indian mobile phone companies.
This new OS will give Indian companies the opportunity to bring smartphone capabilities at even cheaper prices, and to make it a win-win situation for the Indian consumer.
However, Baidu hasn’t confirmed that it is indeed working on an operating system at all, simply stating that the project in question is a mobile ad product.