According to an exclusive special report now available from TelecomWeb, Google’s recently announced “Android” is “just another mobile Linux,” rather than any real technical innovation: i.e., no more than a convenient way for the company to pursue its real goal — to create an advertising delivery system it can control rather than innovating in telecommunications.
Earlier this month, Google unveiled its long-expected thrust into the mobile-phone market. The big surprise is that it didn’t unveil a phone – the putative “Google Phone” many had been expecting. So far, Google only has come up with a business plan that encompasses the consumer market, with no real value for enterprises. And Google’s plan doesn’t depend on the technology behind Android – a technology, says Stuart Zipper, senior editor at TelecomWeb.com and author of “Will Enterprises Take The Google Gamble?,” that’s mainly “smoke and mirrors.”
“The Google plan involves controlling Android development to make sure it provides access to, and supports, rich advertising content, both static and video,” says Zipper. “And critically, it depends on making sure Google is the conduit for that advertising so it can reap the same golden profits it rakes in from advertising on its market-beating search engine. There is little or nothing new Android brings to the table in terms of enterprise-communications needs that can’t already be served by any of the many feature-phone operating systems already extant, including several already based on Linux.”
He continues, “That could well leave the enterprise market the stepchild in Google’s plans, with little to recommend Android-powered phones. But the enterprise market is exactly where the most expensive ‘smartphones’ and PDA/phones, i.e., the BlackBerries of the world, yield the highest revenues. And that enterprise market is ripe for Linux, just as much as for any other operating platform, if there’s a standard programming interfaces (APIs) for developers – and such projects do exist, though Google seems to be ignoring them and trying to shoulder everyone else aside.”
The report compares Google’s projected market share between the consumer and enterprise markets, and it finds a significantly higher share on the consumer side.
“The bottom line is that we think, in the long run, enterprises are going to be most comfortable with smart handheld devices that run an operating system that supports applications that meld seamlessly with their back offices,” Zipper concludes. “And Google has no strategy we can see to do that with Android.”
“Will Enterprises Take The Google Gamble?” is available now. For more information on this special report and to read the executive summary, please visit http://www.telecomweb.com/googlegamble or contact Mike O’Neill at moneill@telecomweb.com or at 973/602-0114.
About TelecomWeb
TelecomWeb encompasses global market-intelligence InfoTrack reports; daily e-letter TelecomWeb news break; TelecomWeb wireless, TelecomWeb broadband and TelecomWeb policy content packages; tariff consultancy Tarifica; and the Web-based business-telephony-product database TelecomTactics. To learn more about TelecomWeb, please visit http://www.TelecomWeb.com.
