Google Planning to Change Smartphone Strategy

Google is changing its smartphone strategy and is planning to develop and manufacture its own mobile devices and compete directly with Apple, according to The Telegraph. To date, Google has had its Nexus range manufactured by LG and Huawei.

Apple has always controlled every aspect of the mobile experience by developing its own iOS operating system and manufacturing process. Contrary to this, Google has focussed all its efforts on the Android operating system and left other manufacturers such as Samsung to build the hardware. This has been a fairly successful strategy and the Android operating system runs on four out of five smartphones sold around the world.

However there are fragmentation problems with this strategy. With so many manufacturers adopting the Android operating system, it is extremely difficult to keep control of the Android ecosystem. Google has struggled with consistency and depending on the device that the consumer using, they may have to wait months for updates. The chart form Statista below demonstrates this fragmentation.

Offerings its own devices could solve the problem in that users could get the best Android experience. This could also secure the future of services such as the Google search engine and Google Play app store.