Google could finally face serious competition for Android

[nir]

It won’t be easy — but major phone makers can actually try

 

The fact alone that Google will start charging in Europe for what one could fairly call “parts of” Android is in itself huge news. The change, announced yesterday as a result of a European Commission lawsuit, is a major shift in Google’s business model and has the potential to loosen the company’s grip on the search and browser market. It is a big deal.

 

But of all the changes that this new licensing model could bring, simply charging licensees might not be the biggest. The biggest detail could end up being that Google’s phone and tablet partners — like Samsung, LG, and Motorola — can now offer Android-based phones in Europe without any Google apps and services on them. That’s a huge deal, and if manufacturers are daring enough to try it, it could lead to a substantially different market for Android phones some years down the road.

 

Until now, Google has locked phone and tablet makers into its ecosystem. If they wanted to include Google’s apps and services at all, they had to include those apps and services on every Android phone or tablet that they made (with the exception of inside China, where Google doesn’t operate). That’s meant, for instance, that Samsung couldn’t release a variant of the Galaxy S9 that only includes the Galaxy Apps store and the Samsung browser and doesn’t include Chrome, Google Play, or Google search.

 

Companies have essentially been forced into this deal. The vast majority of Android apps are distributed through the Google Play Store — and many of those apps rely on Google Play services to function. Abandoning Google would mean abandoning the Play Store, which can mean shipping a device without Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, and so on. Device makers would have to rely on an alternative app store and convince developers to distribute their apps on it, and in many cases rework those apps to function without Google services, too.

 

This was something the European Commission saw as a big problem. And as part of its $5 billion ruling fining Google for “illegal practices” with Android, it required that Google stop placing this exclusivity arrangement on its partners. Google, the commission wrote, denied users “access to further innovation and smart mobile devices based on alternative versions of the Android operating system” and “closed off an important channel for competitors to introduce apps and services” in the process.

 

We’ve never seen what Samsung, Motorola, Sony, HTC, LG, and so on would do on an Android phone without Google. Now, we might.

 

There are valid questions here of whether this is a good idea. All of these companies creating their own app stores and backend services would be a mess for developers and confusing for consumers. The transition would be ugly, and it could weaken the already rough state of premium Android apps.

 

Or, it could lead all these things to flourish. Samsung could go all in on the Galaxy Apps store, or some independent third party could start up its own service that becomes the de facto Android app distributor. Those stores could offer better terms for developers and do a better job enforcing privacy requirements to protect users, leading the app ecosystem to flourish.

 

Perhaps more importantly, we have little idea of what this world looks like, good or bad. We can get a glimpse in China, where apps are split across many different stores — none has more than a quarter of the market, according to the mobile research firm Newzoo — but even that doesn’t paint the full picture. There’s been little incentive for companies to make phone variants, let alone completely different hardware, just for one country. Now they have almost the entirety of Europe to market these non-Google devices to.

 

Even if this isn’t a revolution, it could lead to some notable projects. Amazon’s Google-free Fire tablets are some of the cheapest options on the market. And there’s a sign that other companies could get behind Amazon’s effort. The Commission wrote that it had “found evidence that Google’s conduct prevented a number of large manufacturers from developing and selling devices based on Amazon’s Android fork called ‘Fire OS.’”

 

Who knows if they’ll do that: Companies make money off of Google search referrals, and customers want Google’s apps. This exception is also limited only to Europe, since that’s where the ruling is. That limitation could make it hard for companies to get the scale necessary to make starting up an alternative ecosystem a sound decision, since these devices couldn’t be sold pretty much anywhere else.

 

But they can try. And ultimately, that means that Google has to be careful. Before, Android phone makers had no alternative — now, they do. For Google, which doesn’t truly own Android, that could be the first serious threat to its worldwide phone dominance in years.

Source

[steven36]

This means Microsoft , Samsung , Amazon etc can pay Google if they want  to bundle  there products with Android  and still have access to the play store. As far has Google paying them to take the free Google bundle  is yet to be seen  Google is going to get paid if they dont take it.. but if Google pays the vendors to take the free bundle they will profit greatly like they pay Firefox millions a year and Apple billions a year to stay a search monopoly because only 5% only bother to change there default apps and searches. 

 

But this is not really going benefit the consumer it will still be hooked in the play store    and what ever apps they bundle from Google with there Hybrid Android OS Google will get paid 2 times like Microsoft does once from the vendor for the lic and from the consumer for  showing you ads and  data they harvest off you on what ever apps the vendor  pay to bundle and now also you have to worry about whoever pays for a lic to install there custom apps showing you ads and harvesting your data as well. It's a lose , lose for  the consumer and a win win for big tech. But this  is what the EU wanted is vendors to have a choice to pay google   for rights to the play store if they want too. Just like you always had a choice to use Amazon store  or F-Droid if you don't want to use Play Store.

 

In China Android phones  never has used Google apps so far ,  this is a great example of it benefiting Big Tech and the Government   but not the consumer because the irony is there phones spy on them way  worse than the ones from Google in the rest of the world.

[straycat19]

Out of all the phone makers, Samsung is the worse for adding its apps to phones.  Spent hours rooting and removing all the Samsung, AT&T, and Google apps from a Samsung Galaxy S7.  I like Motorola phones because they don't add much to the phone.  A lot of the custom mods on XDA made phones more user friendly but required more knowledge of the phone than most users possessed.  If you are worried about privacy you can always carry your phone in a portable faraday cage like Off Pocket or wrap it in the many types of faraday fabrics available on Amazon.  These devices block all signals to and from the phone.  

[halvgris]

listen im an android fanboy by hearth but when it comes to security, patches and upgrades.

 

google and android has lost the war.

even my +5 year old recieved a final patch last year. but my flagship phone recieved an update

first after a year after usa or japan had it. why?

 

there is no way you know if your android is patched to cope with the latest threats.

 

my iphone 6 is +6 years and is still supported. i bought one refurbished for around 150 usd

refurbished. it had some strange colors when white was shown. after a month it disappeared.

i guess it was water or any other liquid because now it's gone.

 

apple will hovever find challanges ahead since they have priced they're iphones +4 x higher,

than any other phone with better specs. the total cost now is for me 3 times my rent. apple

did respond to this and said well if you take a 2 year agreement with your isp it is just 1 usd

a day. that just 1 usd a day comes to a lot more in reality.

 

obviously they keep the business men happy since they're allowed to get quita a discount,

legal or not. but they have missed all the ones that barely afford a iphone 5s.

 

we all know apple has no interest in releasing a "cheap" phone like samsung or huawei which

just grows more and more, sertainly in 3:rd world countries.

 

the only way apple is still staying afloat is by the creators apps still working and selling on all

they're 6 year old units. when / if they decide to stop supporting them apple struggles to get

new markets.

 

why pay so much for a simple iphone when you get an ipad pro for less, which is far superiour

to any iphone and still 2/3 of the price for the entry level unit.

 

why is the phone part of iphone priced 1/3 of an ipad pro unit? it doesn't make sense. i have

lots of ipads, just because i was lucky to pay 1/3 of the original price but to be fair i could use

it with skype / facetime and call everyone i know since apart from dad everyone has iphones.