Bzzz. Bzzz, Hello, Ms. Android, It Is Time to Wake Up.

June 20, 2016

Here in rural Kentucky, I thought the Alphabet Google thing had no chinks in its digital armor. Search. Bingo. Loon balloons. Bingo. YouTube videos of cats. Bingo, bingo.

Then I read an allegedly accurate write up called “Huawei Hedges Bet on Google’s Android, Plans In-House OS.” The subtitle hinted as a fork, not a benign open source fork, but a rootin’, tootin’ go-our-own-way change of direction:

Like Samsung before it, Huawei hopes to have a “Plan B” should Android terms go bad.

China has a way of keeping some people alert. There is the communications dust up with Taiwan. There is the island in the sea thing. Then there is the Apple hassle. The middle kingdom seems to be front and center is food fairs too.

The write up reported:

To spearhead the development of an in-house operating system—and improve its Android skin—Huawei has hired former Apple designer Abigail Brody. The report says that the non-Android OS “isn’t far along” and is a “contingency measure” in case Google’s current Android terms become undesirable to Huawei.

Huawei is the number three smartphone OEM, behind Samsung and Apple. The Chinese company isn’t a huge deal in the West, though—a big portion of those sales come from Huawei’s home turf. Huawei is often seen as being in a position similar to Samsung’s, just at an earlier stage of development. Like Samsung, Huawei is a massive company. It’s the world’s largest telecom equipment manufacturer, and it designs its own SoCs. Now Huawei is taking another page from the Samsung playbook and is trying to develop an Android alternative.

The Alphabet Google thing now has to worry about another outfit nosing into the phone operating system business.

My thought is that South Korea is a bit more business friendly to the US than its neighbors to the north.

I am hoping the Alphabet Google thing does not suffer a challenge to its hegemony. After all, what’s the big deal when a US company suggests to a foreign government that it changes its ways. Look at the big picture, not a mere detail.

Stephen E Arnold, June 29, 2016

Written by Stephen E. Arnold · Filed Under Business strategy, Google, Mobile, News

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Stephen E. Arnold monitors search, content processing, text mining and related topics from his high-tech nerve center in rural Kentucky. He tries to winnow the goose feathers from the giblets. He works with colleagues worldwide to make this Web log useful to those who want to go "beyond search". Contact him at sa [at] arnoldit.com. His Web site with additional information about search is arnoldit.com.