Two very interesting articles about Android’s future that are strongly related. First, Vlad Savov wonders why Android OEMs continue to make Android phones when there’s little to no profit to be gained.
If there’s no money in it, why would a company continue to be an Android OEM today? Ideally, every mobile OEM would like a bottom line that looks like Samsung’s, but no others have achieved it. It’s not even certain that Samsung Mobile will sustain its profitability, with industry analysts describing its present Herculean efforts as “running to stand still.” So how do others bridge the cognitive dissonance between the desired outcome and the perpetual failure to achieve it?
It’s no secret that Android OEMs are facing hard times, and since there are no alternatives people are willing to buy, they really don’t have anywhere to go… Except exit the smartphone business.
Interestingly enough, that’s where the second article, from Ars Technica, comes into play.
A report from The Information (subscription required) states that Google wants to take “greater control” over the design and building of Nexus phones. Currently, a Nexus device is a co-branded partnership between Google’s Android team and an OEM, but this report says Google wants to move to a more “Apple-like” approach.
The report says that in the future, “hardware makers will be much more like order-takers, similar to the way contract manufacturers like Hon Hai (Foxconn) follow Apple’s directions for producing the iPhone.” Apple designs its phones, SoC, and other parts and then ships the plans off to third-party factories to have them built.
I’m sure Google is looking at the massive profits Apple is raking in with its iPhone, as well as the tight control Apple gets to exert over its hardware, and thinking to itself: why aren’t we doing this? Looking at the complete failure of OEMs to properly update phones, I can’t do anything but strongly applaud Google taking the Nexus program closer to its chest, and build true Google phones.
http://www.xda-developers.com/google-reportedly-signals-apple-like-…
Simple. Because they aren’t really losing money.
Most of the Android makers are subsidiaries of much larger conglomerates. In many cases they also make hardware components that they sell to other companies. This gives them economy of scale.
Accounting practices such as transfer pricing and paying excessive royalties to parent companies can easily turn a profitable subsidiary into a loss maker.
Edited 2016-02-04 00:09 UTC
So, is that why they bought Motorola and then proceeded to do diddly-squat with them?
Google only bought Motorola for their patent portfolio.
“Google wants to take ‘Apple-like’ control”
The big difference is that they can only go so far with that, because users have the option to switch to a mod.
Well, if they start producing their own SoCs and such, this is very easily “helped”. Also, SecureBoot solutions and such will make it much harder.
If Google wants they can go as much ‘Apple’ as they want.
No, because the Android source is out there up for grabs.
Fat lot of good the source to Android will do you if the boot loader is locked up tight and you can’t install it.
That said, I don’t see Google going that far. They’ve nothing to gain by alienating their users.
Any company can build a phone that runs Android apps without even talking to Google. So far they are not doing that because it is cheaper to just use Google’s version. But if Google gives the market a reason it will happen.
If Windows was free and open source I figure it would have been forked at Windows 8 at the latest.
I don’t know about that. I can see Google doing this. Where would users go? Windows Phone? BlackBerry? There’s literally nowhere else to go but Apple.
Yeah, and that’s where a lot of them will go. If you’re stuck with a closed device, might as well go for the ones who are the best at it. The rest will go to non-Google phones such as… oh, say, Samsung. In other words, the situation will be exactly like it is now, except Google will have cut themselves even further out of the loop.
Code != Device, they can Tivo-lize their own products to their hearts content, since there is no GPL3 code there (as far as I know, has been a while I inspected the code in detail).
The can close up the device and prevent alternatives to be installed on any new device they release, regardless of how open the Android code is.
Making good reliable hardware on time and in vast quantities is very complex.
Making a decent rate of profit on it is very, very hard.
I wish Google the best of luck.
Its interesting that both Microsoft (with Surface) and now possibly Google have decided to compete against their own OEMs in order to take control of more of the product stack.
BTW I wonder if this story is connected to a possible Google move to achieve “Apple-like’ control. Google would need a lot of bespoke silicon
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-02-03/google-said-to-en…
Edited 2016-02-04 10:50 UTC
I don’t think that the Nexus brand is the best place to do this – for a few reasons.
1) Nexus has traditionally been a developer platform
2) Nexus is the test bed for new versions of android – if you want a premium expensive brand then you cant give them software that’s had limited testing.
3) The reaction to the expensive Nexus 6 forced them to go back to cheaper phones the following year.
So I’d say that a Pixel branded phone would be the place to do something like this.
Pixel phone, Pixel(C) Tablet, Pixel (Chrome)Book
Especially if there is truth to the Android/ChromeOS merging rumors.
That would bring them inline with Microsoft’s Surface lineup, and roughly similar to Apple.
Leave Nexus as the cheap developer phone that gets Android releases regular and often – then push updates to the more premium Pixel phone when the major bugs have been ironed out.
I don’t think the name matters as long as Google can convince their customers that it will get timely os version and bug fix updates, good performance and good battery life
Android is open and iOS isn’t!
Tom today!
It’s closing up! Great!
Yeah, Google was dead wrong about Android and created a frankenstein monster.
The OEM’s have proven that they are unable to ship the volumes of phones they claim. In by saying that I am referring to the fact that most of the vendors never supply updated versions of Android for all the models that they ship each year. It is not just shipping a product it’s the whole life cycle that people are after. HTC as an example have shown their complete lack of customer focus on numerous occasions by announcing that models of handsets will be getting updates only to find that later they reverse the decision.
This is a huge problem for the entire internet in general as we have a herd immunisation system on the internet. The more unpatched systems left to float around the more at risk the broader internet is in general. (malware installed could be used to ddos sites, governments, countries etc) with billions of these devices it’s a huge number of potential attack origins.
I have been using nexus devices for some years and would never go back to OEM’s
I can understand that, feel the same about my Apple equipment here
Google is just a couple of steps closer to Apple in the sw/hw integration game then most OEM’s, lets see how far they take it….
After using Swiftkey for years on Android, I now also use it on my iPhone 6 Plus. Unfortunately many of the features are missing on iOS. Here’s hoping that improves. The worst thing on iOS is trying to set the insertion point for editing text. It reminds me of the Android 1-2 days. I keep one keyboard just for the ability to use a gesture across the keyboard to move the insertion point (iKeywi). On Android, I used the arrow keys in Swiftkey.
Using the same flawed logic…
Why doesn’t Google just “quit” and then Apple can own it all… done…
I’m using something extreme to point out the flaw with monopoly strategy being suggested.
..or.. hey Google, buy Apple, kill Android == profit!
I’m sure others can come up with more lunacy….
I can….
Google buy’s out apple and give it all to Microsoft, and then buy’s up Microsoft. Then sell it all to Cuba.
I say, it’s about time. Microsoft is doing this and Apple has allways done it. Then we only need Apple to release iOS for other companies to make iPhone clones. That would even out the landscape.
Edited 2016-02-05 09:27 UTC
I advocate a Redhat style trademark strategy for the future of Android. Google can end up the mess in the Android market by enforcing its trademark so that the canonical Android OS on google designed hardware is called Android phone while the OS continues to be available as free and open source to OEMs. This is much like the RHEL and CentOS relationship in which customers who appreciate first rate support continue to rely on the Redhat brand while the rest of us can enjoy a top tier Linux OS.