China pins its hopes on Gitee as an open source alternative to Microsoft’s Github amid US tech tensions
- Gitee says it is the second-largest open source software platform in the world and wants to challenge the popular GitHub in China
- As China-US tensions rise, Chinese developers are worried about losing access to important open source technology
If you’re not a technology enthusiast, you may not be aware that some of your favourite online platforms rely on open source software. Watching a film on Netflix, swiping through Instagram pictures and many other online activities are all aided by open source technology.
Much of this tech can be found on the largest host of source code in the world, Microsoft-owned and San Francisco-based GitHub. Similar to their peers around the world, Chinese developers have been relying on it to build up the country’s tech industry. But with tensions rising between China and the US, and Chinese companies like Huawei Technologies being cut off from American tech, the country is looking for a plan B.
That plan B is called Gitee and it is run by Open Source China (OSChina), which calls itself the largest open source community in the country. In July, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) chose 7-year-old Gitee to construct an independent, open-source code hosting platform for China, the company said last week.
“Borderless collaboration is one key characteristic of open source, however the geopolitical friction is forcing China to consider alternatives for sustainable tech-driven innovation,” said Charlie Dai, analyst at research firm Forrester.
