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Google Phone Could Drive Apple Into Allegiance With Microsoft
rsmiller510 writes "A BusinessWeek report suggests that the Nexus One release marks the latest volley in an escalating war between Google and Apple, one that could force Apple into working more closely with Microsoft. 'When companies start to imitate one another, it's usually either an extreme case of flattery—or war. In the case of Google and Apple, it's both. Separated by a mere 10 miles in Silicon Valley, the two have been on famously good terms for almost a decade. ... Now the companies have entered a new, more adversarial phase. With Nexus One, Google, which had been content to power multiple phonemakers' devices with Android, enters the hardware game, becoming a direct threat to the iPhone. With its Quattro purchase, Apple aims to create completely new kinds of mobile ads, say three sources familiar with Apple's thinking. The goal isn't so much to compete with Google in search as to make search on mobile phones obsolete. ... Some analysts believe the Apple-Google battle is likely to get much rougher in the months ahead. Ovum's Yarmis thinks Apple may soon decide to dump Google as the default search engine on its devices, primarily to cut Google off from mobile data that could be used to improve its advertising and Android technology. Jobs might cut a deal with—gasp!—Microsoft to make Bing Apple's engine of choice, or even launch its own search engine, Yarmis says."
Apple is a great company, but they are not large enough to build their own search engine, advertising platform, and back end services to run them. Microsoft's search (bing), advertising platform, and back end services are all designed for partnering - its the core business model.
of course, Microsoft will compete with Apple in the phone space at some point in the future (we are clearly uncompetitive now...), but if Apple is going to be in bed with a competitor, its much better that it be Microsoft rather than google - better for both companies. I mentioed this to Symbolset in a post here.
Jibe!
So. Android it is, then. That was an easy decision.
"I might have made a tactical error in not going to a physician for 20 years." -- Warren Zevon
That's it! Apple is done now too! Another nail in their coffin!
I haven't used M$ or Apple since 1935 except for at work, when i play games or when I want to do anything except browse the web.
OpenMoko! OpenMoko!
i may not be able to run apps but I can mod my phones OS... if only I knew how to code.
This conspiracy theory is half baked. Google's core business is search. And based on what we've seen from the Nexus One so far, apple has nothing to fear whatsoever from google in the mobile phone market. The Nexus One hardware is nice, but the software is crap. It's not even remotely a threat to apple's iPhone market. And don't forget that apple sells computers and mp3 players too. This is not enough for apple to ally with Microsoft. They tried that once before, and they got IE for mac out of it. They've learned from that mistake.
I see very little chance of Apple using Bing as the default search provider on the iPhone. More likely they'd want MS to provide ultra compatible Office apps for the iPhone to help them get into the business smartphone market, competing directly with RIM / Blackberry.
No sig for you. YOU GET NO SIG!
Jobs thinks everything Microsoft does is second-rate. He won't team up with them for that reason alone, never mind the fact that Apple has been burned by trusting Microsoft in the past, and I can't see that mistake being made again.
~Philly
granted its 'new to google' to be you know selling phones directly .. but this is not a "war" with carriers or handset makers, its more of a war on.. noone?
Its really not that much different from going to the HTC website and clicking buy now and being directed to a web seller of any given phone as well as the carriers who sell them.. all google is REALLY doing here is creating a platform they can use to advertise android.. by that I mean.. when Verizon is done spamming millions of Droid Does! ads.. Android is left with being just another handset in the carriers collection of handsets.. by creating a direct way of buying , they have more importantly created a direct "sales conduit" that showcases Android and only android devices..
For all intents and purposes this is no different than the ADP1 and ADP2 only now rather than buying unlocked, you buy them with tmobile service, which was the only place the unlocked dev phones worked in 3g anyhow.
If Google was trying to be a gamechanger, they would have become an MVNO buying bandwidth from t-mobile, and reselling it (at reduced rates) in exchange for advertising/collecting demographic data from all the buyers, possibly even going with a pure GoogleVoice device that was IP only and no actual telephone service..
Now if they would just fix the fragmented Android mess of a landscape, do away with the half-assed java applets and move to entirely native apps.. as well as license SenseUI from HTC OR convince HTC to offer its app stack over the marketplace.. they could almost become a decent size player in the mobile space.. until then.. MS/Nokia and Apple will contine to eat their lunch.. Pity that Google didn't buy Palm and kill the Pre before it shipped as it too is hurting Android's long term viability as a platform.
Google bought a mobile ad company called AdMob.
Apple bought a mobile ad company called Quattro.
Whatever happened to doing things in-house?
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Google cannot keep fighting Microsoft/Apple/US DOJ/China/Evil at once and win. They are going to have to find allies at some point or go bankrupt.
And what is it with people loving to predict the demise of the iPhone? Years ago it was the iPod killer and the only company that was able to kill the iPod was Apple.
Never go to sea with two chronometers; take one or three.
To avoid Microsoft Apple could buy whatever is left of AltaVista. And then we'll have Apple Vista. No, wait...
Apple has shown a clear desire to not remain glued to Microsoft. This is evident with the release of iWork and the dead-end path of the Office products on the Apple platform.
Because of my position, I have almost every handheld and PDA device that hits the market. As a seasoned .NET developer, I am biased towards Microsoft. However, that being said, the Windows Mobile platform is horrible. Even on devices like Samsung's Omnia, it is sluggish and cumbersome at best. Memory management is a nightmare.
The only realistic path is for the Windows Mobile platform to die off or be revamped from scratch. At most they may build a mobile version of Office for iPhone and Android but even that is a stretch.
Check out the difference between "there" and "their". It will enrich your life and maybe help to prevent you from pissing off your readers.
[Apple] are not large enough to build their own search engine
Completely wrong. Actually, they already have their own search engine, it's called Spotlight and it works well.
I'm pretty sure they could build some data centers and have a product quickly.
Now, Apple has always worked on profitable markets. I'm pretty sure web search has not enough profit margins for them to consider to enter into that market.
If anything, you will get applesearch through your MobileMe account : paying customers, smaller datacenters because not anyone can access the search engine; no ads, integration with the platform as additional features, that's the only move that can make sense to them.
I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of killer sig, which this margin is too narrow to contain.
Why is it always "war"? You know, it's just possible that the market for mobile phones is large enough to support many different vendors. Apple has consistently shown that they're happy with just a portion of the markets they play in--provided it's the most lucrative end of that market. The iPod is more an anomaly than the norm in terms of how Apple approaches its various markets. Google and Apple stand to gain more here if they continue to cooperate than if they become all out adversaries.
No this does not make perfect sense. Steve has a feud with Bill going back to NeXT. Sorry, but this will never fly. Apple has made their continent and are growing it.
Well, not overtly, but consider Apple's market position: They make shiny white boxes that are overpriced and pander to a small segment of the market. They have a fifth of the computer market and are not trying to expand, mostly because their vertically integrated business model makes it difficult to increase manufacturing. The Mac Mini proved that they had a cap on their production, and they cannot sell their OS alone without suffering greatly in their business model.
And Microsoft's position: They hold 80% of the market and cannot change. This isn't a problem because many large segments of customers are businesses that strongly desire an unchanging OS. MS has demonstrated a near-unbelievable commitment to binary compatibility and enterprise support, cementing its position. It hasn't been able to keep a strong grasp on the netbook and desktop market in recent years, though.
Now, where's the cooperation? Simple. Microsoft uses its deep pockets and inertia to continue to push itself as the dominant, common, utilitarian operating system, while Apple continually compares its products favorably to Microsoft's and portrays its systems as being hip, cool, modern, and fun. We've all seen the "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC" commercials, and they're representative of the mentality Apple tries to inspire in its commercials, being the small underdog fighting against the big man. Remember "Think Different?"
One Slashdotter has a mangled Voltaire quote in his sig about Apple and MS, but in my opinion it's backward. "If there were no Microsoft, it would be necessary for Apple to create one." However, this will never happen, because Microsoft's power to endure is ridiculous. Just like IBM wasn't destroyed in the decades prior, Microsoft can't be brought down by hordes of Apple fans, or waves of Linux supporters.
Of course, I'm really just re-analysing the premises of World Domination 201 here, but it's not like anybody here has read it, right?
~ C.
A good chunk of the iPhone market share stems from customers that are fed up with Windows Mobile and similar crap. I doubt that those would be too happy to be driven back into the hell hole they've just escaped.
Jobs is clever enough not to risk that. He might be tempted but he's not an idiot.
This story sounds like fluff intended to stir the pot. I'm sure people at Apple are keeping their eye on Google and certainly they must realize that your average consumer can only remain loyal so long before they start craving something new and different. However, to suggest that they'll somehow be driven to work with Microsoft simply because of a threat from Google seems ridiculous at best.
Apple is a hardware maker, first and foremost, while both Google and Microsoft are software companies. And Apple has the advantage over the other two that they do also very good resources on the software side. This ensures that in this market Apple will always have the advantage because of far superior integration. Software and hardware is developed concurrently under a unified visions. The other guys basically develop the software then find a vendor to provide a phone that meets certain requirements. And because both Microsoft and Google provide their OSs for a variety of phones it inherently means their systems are compromised. It's far more difficult to provide a unified, closely maintained platform and an integrated app store. And Apple has managed to keep very tight control over their phone despite offering it on AT&T. Most other smartphones are crippled by the garbage service providers dump on there, and I'm not sure the hardware makers have the luxury of making demands.
For Microsoft, and presumably Google once their OS becomes more widespread we are going to see the same kinds of issues with PCs. Apple again wins with integration. The others have to make do with whatever the hardware makers decide to include with the OS.
As for the search engines, those are pretty much irrelevant. Google and Bing are pretty much the only top tier search engines out there. From my experience they produce results of comparable quality. What matters, however is advertising and web apps especially for businesses. One of the big reasons we use Google at my company is because the analytics and extensive marketing resources, and obviously, because it's currently got the biggest market share. I think Microsoft is at a disadvantage here mainly because they're still a more traditional software developer although they obviously have the resources and the experience. In this market Apple is really a non-entity. They've got great OSs and perhaps an app or two that stand out and that's it. I routinely use their iWork suite and am not impressed by it at all. It's no more intuitive than Office and is generally less powerful. Office is still the better suite.
I think ultimately the question is, is Apple looking to compete directly with Google and MS. I realize that the pundits are always clamoring for this sort of direct competition with anything that's even remotely similar but at this point I don't yet see it. It would be a very different focus for Apple. I do think if they were going to take this route it would make sense that they acquired a smaller search engine company and then work on it internally. Partnerships don't always turn out well for Apple and they don't really sync well with the company's focus on integration.
From TFA
"A BusinessWeek report suggests
I suggest something else... who cares?
Some analysts believe the Apple-Google battle is likely to get much rougher in the months ahead
Some people think it may be warm in summer
Ovum's Yarmis thinks Apple may soon decide to dump

Or they may not
Google as the default search engine on its devices, primarily to cut Google off from mobile data that could
Or could not...
The entire post is BS. Could, If, May be, Or may be not
WTF are the Salshdot eds doing? This is a total non story, may be or perhaps, possibly.
Watch those corners
They're also committed to Plays4Sure, MS Java and COM.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
This isn't insightful. The bottom line is that the majority of iPod and iPhone owners are still using Microsoft and most of them have little interest in Apple.
Having got a nexus one, and owned an apple Iphone I have to say you need to take a second look at the google apps. Having the ability to navigate using streetview; identify items by phone; make VOIP calls. Where Google wins is the cloud and Apple need to catch up, as for playing bought tunes apple wins, but for streaming them they have to catch up. Maybe if Apple hadn't rejected some of these apps Apple iPhone would have better software.
Has BusinessWeek learned nothing about Apple over the last 13 years?
Apple does not need to be the only or number one product in a sector to make money. It's nice when they are, because they really, really, make money when it happens. So Google now makes a phone. It is not likely to harm the phone with the better interface as much as the phones with lousy or no interface.
Meanwhile, Google pays Apple for the customers it delivers. I'm sure if Microsoft wants to pay, Apple will cordially listen, but it won't say yes just to frost off Google. They'll say yes if the green comes in from Redmond.
I don't see Apple doing this, while I think MS might make a step in this direction the culture at Apple is typically to avoid these kinds of partnerships. The few times they have tried this, the results have been less than satisfactory.
It's more likely Microsoft will buy someone outright like RIM -- the Windows Mobile platform isn't going anywhere, so the best play is to acquire the industry leader and integrate that with the Windows operating system. There are a few technical barriers for a roadmap like this (eg: BlackBerry is a Java platform), but it will give MS the mindshare it needs to dominate the mobile space.
It remains to be seen what kind of role Google can play in the mobile device market. While Android has some compelling features, it's not nearly as polished as the Apple iPhone nor does it have the maturity of something like the BlackBerry. More importantly, Google is not yet an innovator in the mobile device market - they have copied may of the ideas that are already there and may in fact still be technologically outpaced by the next generation of Apple's iPhone.
Eric Sarjeant
eric[@]sarjeant.com