[SilentEngine]

Originally Posted by clevermax

Android has already 'clicked' where iPhone is still an unknown for many - look how many people around us are using budget Androids. They would never have thought about buying an expensive iPhone though.

You are right from Indian smartphone market POV, but not in global context.

[Sprucegoose]

Originally Posted by SilentEngine

You are right from Indian smartphone market POV, but not in global context.

Internationally bro, android outsells iOS. If you are looking at it from an OS POV.
I bought my SGS2 not because it is a Samsung phone, but because it is an android one. And ofcourae that it is blisteringly fast.
Tomorrow if Motorola comes out with the Droid 4 that outperforms all other android handset I'll switch to it. As long as it has an unlocked bootloader though.

[Newpunter]

Originally Posted by SilentEngine

You are right from Indian smartphone market POV, but not in global context.

Globally, Android now holds about 43% of the Smartphone market whereas iOS holds only 18% of the market. Ofcourse, Android is on many manufacturers handsets, but the point stands that Android is outselling iOS by far.

[srishiva]

Although it gives Google a good patent portfolio, most of the new issues have been with the use of new interfaces and functions associated with touch based phones. Its not about the phone itself. Still would be interesting to watch suing and counter suing.

[Newpunter]

I think these days, Patents have become like the Nuclear Weapons. Google is probably trying to use Motorola's patents as a deterrent incase Apple or Microsoft chooses to go after Android. Also, Motorola was already suing Microsoft and Apple and was under pressure to reach a settlement in both the cases. Google's move is probably to stop that settlement and continue those cases inorder to negotiate some kind of settlement in the other Android vs ( Microsoft/ Apple ) cases.

[SilentEngine]

Originally Posted by Sprucegoose

Internationally bro, android outsells iOS. If you are looking at it from an OS POV.

Originally Posted by Newpunter

Globally, Android now holds about 43% of the Smartphone market whereas iOS holds only 18% of the market. Ofcourse, Android is on many manufacturers handsets, but the point stands that Android is outselling iOS by far.

I wasn't referring to market share, but the overall platform ecosystem which includes other things than just the phone. I know that android smartphone share is bigger than iPhone market share. But if we are talking about iOS as a platform and not just a smartphone, then you have to include iPad also (and even iPod touch which runs the same iOS). With these devices, i think iOS is still leading.

With more honeycomb based tablets in the market, eventually android will catch up on tablet market too and numbers may change. But still if you look at iPhone/iPad market shares individually, they are growing at healthy rate. So both android and iOS are growing at the expense of others like blackberry and nokia etc.

Clearly the recent patent deals haven't gone the Google way. So Google isn't gaining much by just providing OS to other OEM vendors. That's why this move is a strategic one.

[rajushank84]

Copying the comment I posted on Techcrunch:
--

I don't think it will particularly help them bring out better phones, unless they decide to move away from the "open" Android model. The edge Apple have with iPhone is that they can write code and optimize for specific hardware. Either Google can do that and produce equally good (or better) phones to compete with Apple and lose the "open" Android label (with all the partners) or they keep it open and never get to optimize for hardware. Catch 22 for Google.

[Sprucegoose]

Originally Posted by rajushank84

Copying the comment I posted on Techcrunch:
--

I don't think it will particularly help them bring out better phones, unless they decide to move away from the "open" Android model. The edge Apple have with iPhone is that they can write code and optimize for specific hardware. Either Google can do that and produce equally good (or better) phones to compete with Apple and lose the "open" Android label (with all the partners) or they keep it open and never get to optimize for hardware. Catch 22 for Google.

I think Google should do this because
1> You can make sure companies like Nvidia don't mess around. They did it with their PC GFX cards and they are doing it with their android SOCs as well.
Making sure Non Nvidia hardware cannot run their games.

2> If the internal Hardware is standardised, you don't need to make multiple Kernels for a single OS, you can concentrate on only one, which, while giving increased performance will not adversely affect external form factor.

What i mean is that while Samsung have the Exynos and Texas Instruments have their OMAP chips, there should be a standard structure to them. [Dual Core, each core should have a memory controller, they should all follow a standard instruction set]

[deep_bang]

Originally Posted by SilentEngine

I wasn't referring to market share, but the overall platform ecosystem which includes other things than just the phone. I know that android smartphone share is bigger than iPhone market share. But if we are talking about iOS as a platform and not just a smartphone, then you have to include iPad also (and even iPod touch which runs the same iOS). With these devices, i think iOS is still leading.


.

Yeah. That's what I wanted to say. It's not just the number of devices but about the whole Eco system. Now I don't want to make this thread a iPhone versus android battle.
All I meant to say is that Apple has good apps running on 2 or 3 devices atmost while android running on a multitude of devices work great on the higher end devices but not so great on the lower end ones. Also androids are not all androids - they are samsungs, htcs, videocons etc - if you know what I am trying to say.

Which is why a google phone made by google running android might not only be great functionally but also create a much better brand identity than it has today. Just my 2 paise.

[amitk26]

Really long post I realized after typing and posting so save it for leisure reading
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
I do not think Google want to make money from device sale itself because long term strategy has been to make the ecosystem client ( mobile device ) neutral and making client cheap so that people use more of Google cloud and bring revenues. Google Chromium OS is step in this direction as of today it is for laptops but As the bandwidth increases with wider deployment of LTE / 4G there is no reason that gap between Android and Chromium is not bridged.

However if Google tries to use Motorola to make Google handsets to compete with Apple they will shoot in the foot for two reasons.

1. Google is not Apple , Google fanatic customer is an enthusiast technically advanced customer who believes in Google's motto of "Do no evil" and that is why they adopted and nurtured Android despite all it's follies ( There are many actually compared to other mobile Linux platforms)

Where as Apple fanboy does not want to look under the hood and is happy that things are hidden from him.If some feature is not available he gladly accepts it and even defend it thinking Steve might have thought something good.

2. Apple is a classic Velbon good where customer feels happy to overpay and in case of Google he expects free service and thinks Google should make money elsewhere.
So any such move will alienate Google fanboys

Real and obvious reasons of this deal are two.

Firstly Motorola was in possible talks with Microsoft and any such deal would have torpedoed google's long term plans secondly Motorola has 17500 Patents and 7500+ applied most of these are in mobile technologies including in LTE so that will act as deterrent for litigation happy consortium. The valuation of 12.5 Billion $ now looks OK considering Nortel's 6000 patents were sold for 6 billion.

Google has announced that they will run Motorola as separate business entity. This announcement is not enough to ally the fears of other Android device makers.

Internally most of the major partners have internal Platforms as good as or better the Android but they were put to back-burner because none of them had image like Google / Apple which can generate developer traction. Now if there are signs of favoritism like Android lead device only from Motorola rather then from Samsung/HTC they may revive these programs.


Secondly Motorola is old hand so in litigation they carry better image in eyes of judges in various western countries rather then Asian manufacturers. You need to keep in mind that most of the time a district judge in Germany or US is not a computer science graduate but a law graduate and while awarding orders the mass media propaganda of Apple being innovator or even only innovator plays it's part

Some of the Apple patents for which they have received favorable orders from court are laughable known art in computing since 70s they got patents may be because apple filed and there was no one to oppose.

Example
United States Patent: 6343263 awarded in 29th Jan 2002 for which some US court has ruled against HTC. In simple terms this Patent covers DMA data transfer between a modem and an application processor and the DMA access is controlled by a DSP , Software APIs are provided to make this data available to applications.

This is how 100% of phones with 2 processors for modem and AP work since the days cellphones were invented or even before distributed computing systems like telecom switches used to work in same way.

Similarly while doing some prior art search I came across an Apple patent on late binding while loading a dynamically linked lib. Now this is something which is fundamental known art and no patent should have been granted.

Originally Posted by Sprucegoose

I think Google should do this because
1> You can make sure companies like Nvidia don't mess around. They did it with their PC GFX cards and they are doing it with their android SOCs as well.
Making sure Non Nvidia hardware cannot run their games.

2> If the internal Hardware is standardised, you don't need to make multiple Kernels for a single OS, you can concentrate on only one, which, while giving increased performance will not adversely affect external form factor.

What i mean is that while Samsung have the Exynos and Texas Instruments have their OMAP chips, there should be a standard structure to them. [Dual Core, each core should have a memory controller, they should all follow a standard instruction set]

Well none of this is needed as Android uses Linux Kernel and TI , Samsung and others maintain and push their changes to Kernel.org.
However I have heard a rumor that Google is considering buying OMAP business from TI to complete vertical integration.

The standard structure you are talking about is already in place as ARM core anyway there are technologies such as NACL ( native client ) in Google Chromium OS or LLVM ( Open Source initially from Apple) which provide a low level virtual machine to bridge gap in processor architectures.

[tsk1979]

Originally Posted by Newpunter

I'm wondering how much this will affect Android's OEM partners like HTC, Samsung and SE , who have bet heavily on Android and are the main reason for Android surpassing iOS.
In one way, this is a good thing for the OEMs as Motorola was gearing up to sue the Android OEMs inorder to monetize it's patent portfolio and reduce the losses that it has been incurring. With Motorola being snapped up by Google, the OEMs would feel safer from the threat of getting sued by Motorola.
On the other hand, i think the OEMs would start looking at alternatives like Windows Phone, Meego etc more seriously instead of putting all their eggs in the Android basket.

Android is open. Its a platform, not really one locked in system dependent just on google. Samsung/LG/HTC own have enough inhouse expertise to go forward with software(Samsung Bada for example)
Google is not stupid to try and take android for itself. It would fragment the android system, and then it would be history. Google also knows that one Android with multiple manufacturers is the way to go forward. It facilitates apps, and that makes the whole ecosystem move forward.
Kind of like Windows Laptops. Competitors like Samsung/HP/Dell all sell laptops running the same operating system.

[sgiitk]

Originally Posted by Newpunter

I think these days, Patents have become like the Nuclear Weapons. Google is probably trying to use Motorola's patents as a deterrent incase Apple or Microsoft chooses to go after Android.....

This is what is begin said. I am aware that the possession of the core-patents us necessary to be able to market the product at a reasonable price.

Originally Posted by tsk1979

Android is open. ....

Apple & Microsoft have ganged up against Google. Naturally Android users are worried, and there are rumours that htc may float its much acclaimed Sense interface as a separate division. With the CyanogenMod guru joining Samsung the war will only heat up.

[tsk1979]

Originally Posted by sgiitk

Apple & Microsoft have ganged up against Google.

I made this joke up


Apple to Google :
Mere Pass, square thing with gol corners ka patent hai
Shiny white color ka patent hai
Icons ka Patent hai
Tumhare pass kya hai

Google to Apple : Mere paas motorola hai.

[ramki067]

Well only time will tell whether Google made a right decision or not! Moto's mobility division was in parts and majority or the employees in India were moved to other divisions and low/middle end phones were stopped. Mobility division was suffering but atleast we can say its in better hands now and as i said only time will tell with buying this business Google made a right decision or not.

[msdivy]

Like somebody mentioned, Videocon wanted to buy MM. Read that Microsoft was in talks too. Next in line is RIM. Now that MM has gone to Google, Microsoft might be interested in RIM.