I really hope it's NOT Samsung! And I highly doubt it. Unless they want to cater to security-oriented businesses as a new branch-out. But it doesn't make sense to me. They are very locked down and horrible when it come to privacy, data-mining and pre-installed bloat that you can't unbloat.
OnePlus has had a change of heart when it comes ro their philosophy and I doubt it't them.
Nothing seem like they could do something like this, but I don't know. I don't think it would be hard for them to fund development and GrapheneOS itself would probably do a fair share of the workload. Nothing could simply use a shared platform for a new phone, so no "another phone to maintain and develop for" would have to exist at all. In fact, that would probably be a silly move.
LG made really nice stuff (their DACs were a nice touch and their glass speaker over the glass was the kind of cool stuff they tried out). But they were terrible with openness and updates. Quite conservative. The execs didn't sound like they were happy at all about the phone department, it wasn't making much money and they struggled with competition.
Sony would be neat but they seem a bit conservative. And perhaps too big to do something like this? As in afraid of reputation/risks etc? Then again' they might wanna try something new to boost their phone business. They make nice stuff and was one of the few who cared about battery health preservation and giving you the option to set the charge limit to 80 %. They might even have been the first for all I know. But idk, Sony seem way to "big", risk-aware and conservative despite some strategies catering to younger folks. GrapheneOS might just be too out there for them.
Motorola has been an OEM supplier many times, so who know. Maybe?
FairPhone comes to mind. They already have OS options I think. And they're the kind of OEM that seem to care about user rights and security. Many of their customers might already be very familiar with custom Android distros (or forks if you wanna call it that, just don't call it ROMs as that has got to be one of the silliest terms ever coined for a distribution or fork. ROM literally stands for Read-Only Memory!).
Xiaomi does A LOT of different things. They even have a Youpin brand which is, as I understand it, mostly a platform where other brands can sell their products under the Xiaomi Youpin brand. I've seen many examples of products that are just rebranded. Sometimes the other brand is in the title of the listings too. But I don't think it's Xiaomi. While they are quite "international", privacy isn't really their... priority. They even have ads in the system menus... 🙄
Nokia, hmm. They don't seem very open, but they are painfully aware of the Kodiac effect. I don't know what Nokia is doing now, but I would be surprised. It doesn't strike me as a privacy fighter.
So yeah, my likely candidates would be FairPhone, Nothing, Motorola and perhaps (maybe) Sony.
But honestly, I hope Google stops being silly and keep their hardware open! Their phones are genuinely great and there are things I can't see myself leaving behind. Just the haptic feedback is a huge one for me. Then there's the cameras and the bright and efficient displays. Now there's Qi2 and Pixel Snap. And in general some nice touches both in hardware and software. Now with TSMC as their chip maker, we're finally free from Samsungs inefficient and overheating-prone processes (not a typo for processors). Plus ultrasonic fingerprint sensor. The 7-year update promise is a selling-point too, but I think the new GrapheneOS phone will probably at least match that. I hope there will be genuine parts available too, like on the Pixel. Batteries, if not verifiably genuine, are 99 % just scams woth cleared BMS and new sticker. I.e. worn-out batteries. Anyway, these are my thoughts for now.
Eirikr70 And then they will reinstate "don't be evil". ☺️ And the sun will come up and it'll be beautiful and everyone will stop fighting and we'll get world peace. There will be no hunger too. And most importantly, the imperial units system will be abolished and everyone will adopt ISO8601. ☺️ I can't wait, it's gonna be great.