Google Android: The Accidental Empire

http://nikcub.appspot.com/google-android-the-accidental-empire

by nikcub • 15 years ago

133 115 15 years ago

nikcub.appspot.com

Kylekramer4• 15 years ago

It does honestly seem like Google stumbled into a goldmine. Google basically set out to create the Sidekick 2.0 (I don't really get the constant "Android started as a Blackberry ripoff" claims, when there are much more obvious Danger roots). I really don't see Page/Brin/Rubin in a room in 2006, rubbing their hands together thinking they were going to shock the world. It seems more like the Google guys were big Sidekick fans and saw the chance to work with Rubin for relatively cheap. But they kept their options open, made a lot of cautious small bets rather than going all in. They didn't make the iPhone, no, but they placed themselves in a position where they could react to iPhone. By being open to the opportunity and a lot of luck, they essentially became the only choice a monster sized industry had in the face of huge disrupting new competitor.

Google often get slagged for the unfocused, perpetual beta thing. But laser focus is overrated. For example, given the choice of only picking Chrome OS or Android, a laser focused Google would have never gone Android. Overall I think it is much better to admit the future is unknown, and be prepared (especially for a large company with Google-sized resources).

beatle6• 15 years ago

What goldmine? They just replaced Nokia.

Android is the new Nokia. Lots of worthless Market share, Zero profit.

EDIT: I realize i'm going to be down voted for this. But if you don't think it's true, you're delusional.

Kylekramer4• 15 years ago

The profits obviously aren't as simple as x widgets cost y dollars to produce and sell at price z (might change with the impending Motorola acquistion) and it is probably never going to be known strictly how much Android makes. But if you think Google can't convert half a million new Android phones a day into money, you haven't been paying attention to Google at all.

untog4• 15 years ago

Lots of worthless Market share

Every user having their searches funneled through your search engine. Tight integration with your e-mail service, your video sharing service and your VOIP service. Much, much more.

Millions of people conducting their lives through your product is definitely not 'worthless'.

pavlov• 15 years ago

Just a few years ago, the old Nokia was consistently bringing in >1 billion USD in profit per quarter.

If your theory is correct and Android has simply replaced Nokia, it's making a good amount of money for someone. (Unless $1B == 0 in your world.)

slykat• 15 years ago

I don't understand why I keep hearing this mantra so often - it's completely off-base.

Android is clearly a goldmine. The goldmine is the incremental search revenue Google gets from controlling the Android platform. Why do you think the search volume on mobile is a hockey stick at Google? Literally every single android device has a dedicated search button on it; iOS devices do not. Which device do you think has higher searches per user? The incremental search volume (and search ad revenue) is enough to justify the entire Android investment.

More importantly, without Android, Apple had the ability to lock out Google from mobile search by changing the default search provider to non-Google. The lost revenue if Apple changes its mind and Google is locked out of mobile search? There's your 2nd goldmine.

The argument that Android is not a money maker is like the argument that Gillette selling razors below cost is bad idea. At the end of the day both Gillette and Google make a tons of money off selling something that isn't exactly the main product, but is peripheral to it. In Gillette's case it's razor blades, in Google's it's search.

tnuc• 15 years ago

There is a lot of profit in the Google ads that permeate so many android apps.

icebraining3• 15 years ago

I downvoted you purely because of your edit.

interlagos2• 15 years ago

You should be downvoted for it, and it's sad that you haven't thus far.

Worthless market share? Zero profit? Such emotionally-driven hubris has no place on HN.

webwright2• 15 years ago

I'll downvote you because I think you're missing the point.

Android makes Google $2.5B/yr (that's a run rate, up from $1B this time last year). Google's total run-rate is about $35B by comparison.

Given that it's in land-grab mode, I imagine they are re-investing like crazy in Android-- they realize that the dominant smartphone operating system has a lot of market power. As an example, Microsoft makes more on Office/Server stuff than they do on Windows.

tl;dr Comparing a dominant operating system (Android to a hardware company that grudgingly made software (Nokia) isn't really valid.

diminish2• 15 years ago

Personally owning, several androids in the family as phones and tablets, I am thankful to Google for pushing open source to a proud leader. All manufacturers may freely use it and may offer newer phones. I wish I will be able to play more with Android the way I do with my Linux, as soon as Nexus like devices become commonplace. Thanks Google.

ethnomusicolog• 15 years ago

I don't understand why you attribute it to luck. Don't we have plenty of evidence of how much smart google top management can be?

rdouble2• 15 years ago

It seems more like the Google guys were big Sidekick fans and saw the chance to work with Rubin for relatively cheap

Android the company was built to sell to a larger company. The acquisition could be attributed to the shrewdness of Android's sales pitch to Google.

beatle6• 15 years ago

who said Android's cheap?

Real cost of Android =

Android acquisition price +

Motorola acquisition price ($12.5 Billion) +

Lawsuits

sedev3• 15 years ago

Maybe a silver mine, but definitely not a goldmine. Apple is still taking home the lion's share of the profits in mobile, which the author of the article rather ignores.

mey• 15 years ago

I'm sure Android is much more to Google then the Android Market place.

Like iOS device, it's also creating an ecosystem of devices/service. How many people now have gmail accounts, and are searching through google then before they had Android devices?

Google hopefully understands (don't see any indication they don't) that they are getting a channel to market directly to users as well as obtain new users. This system gives them a platform to directly compete in a variety of media markets, now as a content provider in addition to their ad model.

pacomerh• 15 years ago

There's huge opportunity for android, just look at what's happening with the amazon market, that should give you an idea of how android can be re-invented and sold to a world-wide user base. Plus the more affordable equipment. Of course this means there will be more crappy versions of it, but that's exactly what happened to windows and the pc.

nl7• 15 years ago

But Google's profit margin on Android is probably better, if you consider it as "revenue from app sales + revenue from Android mobile search + app licence revenue - cost of development"

Apple has that pesky hardware business eating at the margins. They are a very, very efficient manufacturer, but hardware margins are always less than software (especially search, which might be the most profitable business ever in terms of margin).

(Also, don't forget Google makes a huge amount off mobile search on iOS devices).

Steko• 15 years ago

It's more like Google's stumbled onto a gold mine that's already been looted:

Google makes $5-$10 per Android phone, maybe 10% of what it's partners make. That's about the same amount as Microsoft makes off each Android phone and is perhaps 1/50th of what Apple makes off each iphone.

Even worse it turns out that the half empty gold mine is on public land and any crazy old coot can waltz in and start mining themselves:

Android won their "empire" by being the only credible licensed iphone clone in 2009. The real question is whether this empire is going to be of the Han/Roman/Windows variety as so many commentators assume or will it be a short lived dynasty like the Qin/Napoleonic/Netscape variety.

I'll put my money on a Three Kingdoms scenario playing out. Why do I think WP 7 has a ghost of a chance when everyone's done nothing but dismiss them? Let's review:

Android phones started shipping in Fall 08. However they really didn't have any traction until Fall 09 when Verizon started pushing the Droid. And it wasn't until Froyo phones shipped en masse in Summer 2010 where Android started to dominate carrier shops.

In the same way WP7 launched buggy, incomplete and lackluster in late 2010. It had no traction for it's first 3 quarters. Lately though we've seen a mature OS update released on a 2nd generation of phones that were designed for it.

More importantly Microsoft has made no secret of it's desire to buy market share with retail subsidies. And it will certainly be buying this market share at Android's expense. How much they're willing to lose buying this market share isn't clear but if it's anything like the money they've plowed into Bing that's a lot.

karlmdavis• 15 years ago

Do you have citations for your $5-$10 figures?

Also, you're neglecting to account for the money they're making from the Android market: apps, movies, books, etc.

ypcx• 15 years ago

The future is Open Source. That's why Microsoft has no place there. Also don't be fooled by how much money is made where. Money is just a tool; one of.

eavc3• 15 years ago

Google has other agendas than profiting from the sale of phones. They have an application store, a music store, a movie store, and a book store, for starters.

They also have an ad business which gets to safely live on the most popular smartphone OS without real risk of it being shut down for competitive reasons.

They have a massive lever with which to move other projects as well. They have millions of users of their maps program on mobile, for example. They get voice search data. They get people doing searches. They get many more Gmail subscribers. Soon those millions will be nudged toward using G+ because it comes on their phone and offers some nice benefits.

As for whether or not Android is here to stay, there's a measure of user lock-in just like there is with the iPhone. You already have your applications and media that you have paid for.

And according to most everyone, their latest version of the OS is a marked step forward, bringing Android's weak points up close to parity with iOS while continuing to build upon the relative strengths that have been there for the past few major releases.

Microsoft may gain traction with their phone and ecosystem, but I'm not sure why that's any reason to forecast that Android will go the way of Netscape.

mtrimpe• 15 years ago

Don't forget the $1/year market value of a GPS probe.

I work for TomTom who's been battling for years to collect GPS probes so that they could provide the best HD traffic.

Google recently announced their Traffic layer which magically offered almost similar quality with full world-wide coverage all made possible by their thousands and thousands of free Android GPS probes.

Just a small reminder that there might be more hidden benefits of Android.

fpgeek3• 15 years ago

"They didn't make the iPhone, no, but they placed themselves in a position where they could react to iPhone."

Exactly. They set themselves up so they could quickly react to disruptive change in the smartphone market. The iPhone happened to be what came along.

Most people don't understand what an impressive accomplishment this is. Let's look at how long it took for some other smartphone competitors to release their response to the iPhone:

Palm took two years (and started over from the ground up). Microsoft took three years (and still doesn't have traction). Nokia took took four years (and then threw it away). RIM still isn't there yet (next year?).

And Google? They took one year. They clearly were doing something right.

BTW, props for remembering Danger. So many people don't in these discussions and (for someone who was working with smartphones back then) it is incredibly frustrating.

rimantas• 15 years ago

  > And Google? They took one year. They clearly were doing
  > something right.

Like buying Android Inc. in 2005?

colkassad• 15 years ago

I wonder how different the market would be had Apple not given AT&T exclusivity. Honestly, I think Android still would have done well, but does anyone think the exclusive deal with AT&T hurt Apple in the long run?

notatoad• 15 years ago

i'm not sure "hurt apple" is the right way to put it, as i see it pretty much everybody who wants (and can afford) an iphone has one. apple hasn't lost anything yet because of the deal.

the exclusivity deal allowed android to gain a foothold, but i don't see android as a competitor to iphone, just an alternative. people who buy android phones are people who don't want an iPhone and probably wouldn't have bought one anyways.

eavc3• 15 years ago

I disagree. I wanted an iPhone but couldn't get it because I was on Verizon.

I also happen to be someone who influences my friends and family on technology. When Android turned out to be a great experience, I told other people. Now my mom, sister, sister's boyfriend, both brothers-in-law and their wives, and my mother-in-law are all Android users.

Every single one of those people would have purchased an iPhone if Android wasn't around.

qdog• 15 years ago

Not a straightforward scenario. Doubtful most other carriers were willing to make the same deal AT&T made at the time (no customization, etc.). People were waiting in line for iPhones to begin with, so they would have to have had different manufacturing, etc. Apple could have probably even released a Cocoa Stack or something to run the iOS ui on any Android phone out there and gobbled up a huge market, but Jobs wanted total control, and seeing Apple's current profitability, it's hard to realistically predict a better move than the ones he made.

FD: Until a couple of weeks ago I owned no Apple products except a very old ipod nano someone gave me years ago. I'm no fan of Apple, but it seems unrealistic to second-guess the success they had for the last decade.

falling2• 15 years ago

I'd be more interested to know what would have happened had Apple not built a phone.

Nemisis7654• 15 years ago

Like someone mentioned above, I do not think it "hurt" them. I think it limited them a little. Think about what it was like before the iPhone came to Verizon. There were a lot of people praying that it would because they simply would/could not make the switch to AT&T. That limited the reach of the iPhone a little. Not everybody is willing to switch their provider just for one phone.

orangecat2• 15 years ago

Well, that counterfactual implies a world where the carriers don't have a stranglehold on the market and the ability to cripple or deny service to hardware and software they don't like. In that world Android would be better off as well; phones wouldn't have unremovable bloatware or disabled functionality, and they'd get updates in a timely manner.

untog4• 15 years ago

I don't think that Android's success is relative to the iPhone- in many ways, it's a greater reflection of the failure of Nokia and, to a lesser extent, Blackberry.

To explain: Apple generally tends to be happy making more expensive, premium products that command a smaller section of the market. They're happy to sacrifice greater market potential to do so- like not allowing carrier customisations, making multiple models, etc. They've compromised this somewhat for the iPhone (they clearly didn't want to have carrier-subsidised handsets originally, for example) but it has worked out for them in a huge way. Still- historically, the ubiquity of the iPhone is in some ways atypical for Apple.

Nokia, on the other hand, has always been more than happy to play ball with the carriers. They should be where Android is now- the ecosystem with a ton of different phone models, carrier-bundled apps, cheap phones and a huge market share. If they had played their cards right Google might still be relegated to teaming up with Apple on mobile. But Nokia left the market wide open- Apple compromised a little to move into the space but Google saw the gap and went for it 100%.

bad_user5• 15 years ago

Android is crushing Nokia not because of the cheap phones - but because it can scale from cheap to expensive, from featured to luxury. A cheap Android phone, like LG Optimus One gives you partly the look and feel of an expensive smartphone.

In contrast, Nokia's featured phones with Symbian on them are great for their cost, but they do feel cheap. And an expensive smartphone with Symbian on it still feels cheap.

     I don't think that Android's success is 
     relative to the iPhone

I disagree. The iPhone is probably the biggest reason for Android's success. It first started when Apple decided that an AT&T monopoly was worth it. And it happened in Europe too - in my country only Orange was originally selling iPhones, until iPhone 4 came out.

Like in a bad movie when an old dude sitting on its porch says "a storm is coming" ... carriers and phone makers began freaking out and saw in Android THE alternative. It is a good alternative. And while Apple may have a huge network of stores, it cannot compete with the distribution network of multiple vendors.

(EDIT: rephrased the last paragraph)

untog4• 15 years ago

* carriers and phone makers began freaking out and saw in Android THE alternative.*

Oh, sure. But my point was that Android being THE alternative was a failing of Nokia and Blackberry over anything else.

eavc3• 15 years ago

>It first started when Apple decided that an AT&T monopoly was worth it.

I think that's an astute point. I wanted an iPhone but was on Verizon. So I eagerly snatched up the Droid, a phone that was actually better in many ways than the iPhone of the time. There must have been hundreds of thousands like me.

wanorris• 15 years ago

I'm not saying that the iPhone is anything other than an unqualified success, but the idea that Apple didn't really want that market share anyway seems a little off.

Apple seemed quite happy to have 70% share or whatever it was with iPods. They've also offered cheaper models whenever they needed to to try and address more of the market -- for example, the iPod Shuffle, or the free-with-contract iPhone 3GS. The Apple TV certainly wasn't priced only to appeal to the high-end market.

I think the article makes quite clear that it is primarily Nokia and RIM that have been devastated, but I don't think it's all inappropriate to look at the way Android has been successful at pulling share away from these companies as something that they have done better at (from a market share standpoint) than Apple.

Macha• 15 years ago

> I'm not saying that the iPhone is anything other than an unqualified success, but the idea that Apple didn't really want that market share anyway seems a little off.

It's more that they didn't want the damage to their core brand caused by the measures needed to gain that market share.

You will never gain majority market share with a premium device in a market that is essentially "everyone". (Obvious exception is if there is no premium price tag associated with it, but not the case for the iPhone, at least here) There will always be a huge number that go for the budget device. Releasing a budget device will cause a large number of people to judge your product and your brand by that device. How many people judge Android by devices such as the Xperia X8 or Wildfire S? These phones are budget phones compared to the heavyweights like the Xperia Play, and for the manufacturers to be profitable with these budget phones, serious compromises had to be made. Because of this, many people associate Android with the laggy, low res, constantly running out of memory experience of these phones rather than the phones that are actually trying to compete with the iPhone head on, like the Galaxy Nexus. Not something you want to do if your entire brand is based around being a premium item.

Not to mention that if you release a budget item, it is going to take some sales from the premium version as some users settle for "good enough". The continued sales of the 3GS are actually a good example of this. At least that has the stigma of being old at this stage, but if Apple released a new budget device and a new phone in the vein of current iPhones every year, how would that affect the sales of the (more profitable) traditional iPhone?

Of course, the reason it made sense for Google to do so is that they didn't have the expectation from their customers of being a best of brand, premium item. This meant that they couldn't really break straight into the high end market easily, but it also meant they didn't have a reputation to uphold. If the iPhone 5 was a usability disaster, I'd imagine that'd make Apple's customers more skeptical of future Mac purchases for example. A bad Android phone won't hurt Gmail on the other hand. Indeed, customers might blame it on the manufacturer, and still buy a Android phone as their next phone. On top of that, the budget end of the market is a lot more flexible (what's cheapest this week?) than the winner take all nature of many high end markets (This is a lot of money. What do other people already own?), so when you're later to the game, I'd imagine that end of the market is easier to break into.

joebadmo• 15 years ago

That's the beauty of Google's spaghetti-at-the-wall approach, isn't it? To me, it's kind of a refreshing, child-like approach to things, with an investigative curiosity and implicit acknowledgment of an ignorance of what will become important.

While I think Larry Page's new focus on focus is great, and I think most of their products are getting better because of it, I do get a bit scared that it comes at the cost of the explorative nature of the company in its youth.

diminish2• 15 years ago

Agree so much. Android is a perfect toy Google has developed to disrupt the established players and stopped a 1984-like future in mobile. Neither Blackberry BES nor Apple's single-device behind a walled garden were for me; and Thanks to Android I have choice.

beatle6• 15 years ago

Yeah. A crappy choice. I would not be saying this if Android was such a beacon of software quality.

Android is just Google's tool to serve users ads. Nothing more.

bluemarc22• 15 years ago

Wow, awesome comment!

bitwize• 15 years ago

Apple has a spaghetti-at-the-wall approach too.

The thing is, they rigorously weed out non-working ideas and use the time and energy saved to apply extra polish to the working ones.

The result is products that are just about as close to perfect as it is possible to be in an imperfect world.

I see nothing like this sort of selection pressure going on at Google; accordingly, shoddy architectures like Android not only make the cut, but go on to be Really Big Things if they're good enough to accumulate network effects. Kinda like Windows and Office.

mahyarm• 15 years ago

So how do they know that it sticks before they release it? I wouldn't think Zynga would of made money until they released it.

rdouble2• 15 years ago

Maybe android is getting better but google reader and gmail got worse to the point where I switched to other software.

superasn3• 15 years ago

Google mantra of do no evil is at the heart of this success again. I really admire that they've kept it open source and not followed their competitors in creating ridiculous policies such as taking a cut of e-book sales, policing for adult content, banning all apps that interact directly with the hardware or try to do things outside of their limited API, etc.

Spearchucker• 15 years ago

They haven't kept it open source, strictly speaking (ref. Honeycomb). Their naivety has left them dangerously exposed on patents, the recent CarrierIQ debacle is an example of the dangers of Android's openness, and any worthwhile app in the Android Market is hacked and re-submitted as a free app before you can blink an eye. Google's not making money from Android, and neither are developers*. That's not even starting on the security vulnerabilities, or the fact that Google's business model is based on a premise of invasive personal data-slurpage to sell more ads.

Granted, that's a generalization. But it makes the point.

superasn3• 15 years ago

I will agree with you on the patents, but as far as the security is concerned that's just security through obscurity, which isn't any better.

As far as making money is concerned I don't see the reason why? Android has a good market-share, a good marketplace, and it even allows for in-app purchases. What's stopping them from making money here?

kgen• 15 years ago

Why so negative looking? All releases except for Honeycomb have been opensourced allowing for a number of custom roms used on millions of devices (cyanogen, miui) which is more than can be said for other platforms. The openness of Android apps allow for applications and innovation not possible on the iphone or other devices (custom lock screens, homescreens, NASA's phonesats). The CarrierIQ debacle involved all major phone developers including Apple (prior to iOS5), BB, Nokia as well.

Granted, that's a generalization. But it makes the point.

danssig4• 15 years ago

I really hate that motto since it's so good at blinding otherwise intelligent people. It has nothing to do with anything. Google's polices aren't "good" and Apple's aren't "evil". They're both engaging in trade offs. Apple can make sure every user has a nicer experience at the cost of some freedoms. Android offers more freedoms at the cost of some people having ridiculous battery life, trojans stealing people's credit card numbers every so often, etc. Google has taken the exact same trade off that MS took back in their day.

superasn3• 15 years ago

Actually, Apple certainly doesn't follow the do no evil thing much like Google does. If you have any instances of Google doing such malicious things like Apple is doing, I'd love to be informed (also will help remove my misgivings):

http://my.opera.com/haavard/blog/2011/12/09/apple-w3c

halo• 15 years ago

It does require a step back to realise the magnitude of change: Google have managed strumble into Microsoft's position in phones.

On the surface, that's both astounding and completely unexpected.

Google put itself into that position by being a neutral 3rd party that manufacturers could trust coupled with a realisation that most phone manufacturers were great at hardware but terrible at software.

The outcome is that the companies who didn't see software as their competency and were willing to drop their OSes (Samsung, Motorola, HTC) have reaped the benefits while companies whose strengths were based around their software being slightly better than their competitors (RIM, Nokia) have fallen behind.

masklinn• 15 years ago

> Google have managed strumble into Microsoft's position in phones.

Yes and no: they have a similar marketshare, but Microsoft had marketshare and money. Google only has the marketshare (and in a limited fashion at that, since implementors "improve the experience" pretty drastically) and get little to no money out of it (likewise for a number of their implementors, too).

And implementors are anything but locked in, as Android holds little software primacy. It does have a lively store, catching onto iOS's, but Android is not "essential", and so far I've not seen any critical software running on android and android only. This means with a little business acumen and some software investment (note that they usually fail at both, but...) most Android implementors can get away from Android pretty fast. And in fact most seem to keep hedging their bets (apart from Moto anyway), either by having WP handsets as well (HTC) or by keeping a ready and used "internal" OS (Samsung's bada)

nknight• 15 years ago

Where are you people getting this "Android makes no money for Google" perception from? Android makes money for Google in exactly the same way all of their other products/services make money: Advertising.

nextparadigms2• 15 years ago

It's really just very very early for the smartphone market, and Android is the fastest growing mobile OS. Its potential is more like 20x bigger user base than it has now. They will be able to make a lot more money than they do now from Android.

TechNewb7• 15 years ago

From an IP perspective, do you think Android is legal? From Java, to multi touch, to design aesthetics. Is Google doing to the OS industry to what they did to the news paper and media industry where IP is considered 'obsolete'. And a silent emperor sits over the valley of chaos?

TechNewb7• 15 years ago

Just google: is android legal?

ceejayoz2• 15 years ago

> Is Google doing to the OS industry to what they did to the news paper and media industry where IP is considered 'obsolete'.

Google didn't do much to the newspaper and media industry.

They mostly screwed themselves, with some help from competitors like Craigslist in their profit centers like classifieds.

TechNewb7• 15 years ago

I'm mainly playing devil's advocate here. But many, if not all, of google's empire is based around curating other people's IP, including Android.

Much of the IP Google does have is kept server side, safe from competitors.

But the legal issues are real, and I imagine many of the downrates of my previous comment was of either google developers or people within that eco-system.

Why did Microsoft take so long to make Windows Phone, and why does it legally appear safe? And how is that related to Android?

But don't get me wrong, I love Google for search and web apps, just not operating systems that, to at least me, seem slightly trojan in nature.

inoop2• 15 years ago

Imho Android has been successful because, until recently, it had no competition. Android came around at a time when the increasing complexity of building and maintaining a proprietary software stack was forcing handset builders to essentially become software companies. Android gave them the option to return to doing what they did best. Nokia and RIM tried to maintain their own stuff and suffered heavily for it.

I think that Android's success is due to its business model, not the quality of the software itself. The Android team should take care to not become the next Netscape.

bad_user5• 15 years ago

I think Microsoft taught us 3 valuable lessons:

1) distribution agreements and good relationships with hardware makers trumps quality - that's how they've beaten Apple and IBM (OS/2 Warp, launched in 1994 was better than Windows 95 and compatible with DOS and Win 16)

2) worse is better, a lesson they themselves took from Unix - timing is more important, you can always improve later

3) operating systems are natural monopolies - if you win the market of low-end PCs and keep growing, you'll eventually take over the whole market

If anything, I fear Google is the next Microsoft. I hope not because I love Android.

icebraining3• 15 years ago

Google is more open than Microsoft ever was, though. There's no Cyanogenmod of Windows.

jrockway3• 15 years ago

Android gave them the option to return to doing what they did best.

Did any of them take that option? The first thing I do when I get a new Android phone is to re-image it with what Google provides. Samsung and HTC have shown that all the hardware makers can do is write crap software to replace the working software they got for free. And then never ever even think about updating it or fixing the bugs.

inoop2• 15 years ago

Most handset makers already had large software departments at the time they made the switch to Android. I guess they needed to give them something to do? Either way, ZTE and Huawei seem to do pretty well with near-AOSP roms.

sek• 15 years ago

I don't think that's the whole story. This could also be a PR spin. Google said later very often they feared an Apple monopoly on the smartphone market and Android is there to prevent it. Also Schmidt hates Microsoft to the bone and is happy about everything that hurts them.

What makes Google appear unfocused is their long time thinking, they don't care if something integrates in another product only 5 years later. I bet the Google Car and Google Maps integration will be perfect and they also create 3D models of their environment what fits in Google Earth.

Coincidence? I don't think so, these 3 incredible smart guys have all day to think about that.

Google Android: The Accidental Empire

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