The shockwaves of the recent announcement that Google is buying Motorola Mobility, the handset and device division that spun off from the Motorola mother ship not long ago, will continue to ripple far and wide. There are several reasons why this could be a great boost for Android, but also some major concerns about getting the two companies and their product lines to blend well.
Google’s purchase of Motorola’s mobile phone division was major news on Monday, but not entirely surprising to industry insiders. Indeed, a fierce battle has been raging in the smart-phone world, and the stakes couldn’t be higher. The ultimate winner will largely control the future trajectory of personal computing.
Apple's World Wide Developers Conference keynote last week will be remembered for two things: the bloodbath of disrupted developers and apps it left in its wake, and that it was as important for cloud services as the iPod was for digital music, and that the iPhone was for smartphones.
If the jam-packed Android booth at Mobile World Congress, the ubiquity of the robot logo, and the line of people queuing up 2 hours ahead of Erik Schmidt's (swan song) keynote, then the answer is "yes." The booth actually had a nice vibe to it; though it was crowded, it was also quite easy going and people were enjoying themselves. There was a nice smoothie bar making interesting flavored drinks named after Android releases (Honeycomb, etc.). The entire space was really focused on app and hardware partners showing off their wares (all wearing matching t-shirts no doubt provided by Google - take that fragmentation!)
