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Some of you may have heard of Google coming up with their own "G-phone" well, there is news, somewhat about the so called G-Phone. Well don't be too happy yet but this interesting bit of news might actually herald the coming of the G-Phone... or not. A new open software platform called Android has been announced and its a collaboration between Google Inc., T-Mobile, HTC, Qualcomm, Motorola and others through the Open Handset Alliance. Big phone brands like HTC, Motorola, Samsung and LG have already been linked to it and we can expect a roll out of phones with the software to come out in the second half of 2008.
Thirty-four companies have formed the Open Handset
Alliance, which aims to develop technologies that will significantly
lower the cost of developing and distributing mobile devices and
services. The Android platform is the first step in this direction -- a
fully integrated mobile "software stack" that consists of an operating
system, middleware, user-friendly interface and applications. The Android platform will be made available under one
of the most progressive, developer-friendly open-source licenses, which
gives mobile operators and device manufacturers significant freedom and
flexibility to design products.
The inclusion of HTC in the group is interesting considering that HTC rolls out quite a bit of Microsoft Windows Mobile devices. So come second half 2008 will we be seeing less Microsoft based HTC products? Well we can only wait and see.
Read on for more. (News courtesy of Gizmodo)
The 34 alliance members include the following:
Aplix (www.aplixcorp.com), Ascender Corporation (www.ascendercorp.com), Audience (www.audience.com), Broadcom (www.broadcom.com), China Mobile (www.chinamobile.com), eBay (www.ebay.com), Esmertec (www.esmertec.com), Google (www.google.com), HTC (www.htc.com), Intel (www.intel.com), KDDI (www.kddi.com), LivingImage (www.livingimage.jp), LG (www.lge.com), Marvell (www.marvell.com), Motorola (www.motorola.com), NMS Communications (www.nmscommunications.com), Noser (www.noser.com), NTT DoCoMo, Inc. (www.nttdocomo.com), Nuance (www.nuance.com), Nvidia (www.nvidia.com), PacketVideo (www.packetvideo.com), Qualcomm (www.qualcomm.com), Samsung (www.samsung.com), SiRF (www.sirf.com), SkyPop (www.skypop.com), SONiVOX (www.sonivoxrocks.com), Sprint Nextel (www.sprint.com), Synaptics (www.synaptics.com), TAT - The Astonishing Tribe (www.tat.se), Telecom Italia (www.telecomitalia.com), Telefónica (www.telefonica.es), Texas Instruments (www.ti.com), T-Mobile (www.t-mobile.com), Wind River (www.windriver.com).
You might notice that certain big names like Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Apple, Blackberry/RIM and of course Microsoft is not in it. Considering all 4 phone producing companies have had successes without using the Microsoft platform shows that business is as usual for them.
Of course most Microsoft detractors shouldn't hail this as a succesful attack against the Redmond company. The Microsoft Mobile platform is still the defacto platform for PDA phones and most likely HTC and other PDA phone makers will still come to rely on the platform. Let's not forget that the Microsoft Mobile platform still has its fair share of supporters. However, should Android gain a momentum into the PDA phone space in say the next 2 years, Microsoft will most likely have a bit competition in its hands.
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