By 
Google buys a lot of stuff. They have the money to do that. And when they buy stuff, it doesn’t always turn out to be worth the hefty asking price. Fortunately, our beloved Android sits on the other end of that spectrum. Speaking at the Stanford Accel Symposium, Google’s David Lawee – vice president of corporate development – called the acquisition of Android their “best deal ever.”
He admits there was skepticism after dotting the final I’s and crossing the last T’s, but the reported $50 million they spent to acquire Andy Rubin’s corporation proved to be a tremendous success. We just heard that Google’s expected to make $1 billion from their AdMob-assisted mobile strategy in the next year alone.
That would mean their initial investment of $750 million would come right back around, and then some. By 2014 – when analysts expect Android to be the number 1 operating system in the world – that $10 billion per year goal might just become the reality that Google wants it to become.
After acquiring AdMob, Google’s Android strategy has shifted from “revenue through search” to “revenue through apps.” (It would be more accurate to say these two are working in conjunction, though.) There are now over 100,000 applications in the Android market, to date, and more developers are beginning to use ads in order to offset poor sales of paid versions of their offerings.
And now we see why developer mindshare is just as important to Google as any other part of the equation. AdMob – being the defacto platform for serving up ads in Android apps – enables Google to take a fast-growing software-driven ecosystem and turn it into cold, hard cash.
[via Venture Beat]
Wasn’t android originally named “danger”? I think it would have been cool to keep that name, along with an emblem similar to apples, but with a bomb instead.
While I think Android has been a huge success, it appears that Android needs to adapt to recent changes in the environment. An android user since mid 2009, I hate the fact that all the best apps still comes to iPhone first and Android last, if ever. I’m still looking for my Netflix app, Old Mac (for my toddler), Lux, Word with Friends (though Wordfeud and Wordwise have sufficed).
Also, apps crash a lot. I’m running a stock MotoDroid, so I can’t blame any mfr UI. To clarify, the OS crashes a lot. Glitches abound during basic functions, switching between camera to music to answering a phone call.
There are threats in the market that Google needs to countermand: 1) it is a delusion to believe that an iPhone on Verizon will not set back Android’s gains 2) several weaknesses that Android exhibits leaves the door open for Microsoft’s 7 mobile OS to replace it. If Microsoft figures out how to at least reach parity with Android (copy and paste, integrated mailbox) and it can combine the Zune music experience (better than Android stock), an Xbox mobile experience worthy of PSP, and equal compatibility with 3rd party apps, then forget about it – I’m switching, and you can bet that most of the Phandroids will too.
Symbian is dropping market share in smartphone by 10% per year. I think Android will be #1 a lot faster than that prediction. Probably by the end of next year.
“[snip] – I’m switching, and you can bet that most of the Phandroids will too.”
Don’t speak for me as I’m not switching, as early adopter (G1) Android is getting better for me.
Alexander: “Danger” is the subsidiary of Microsoft that made the Sidekicks for T-Mobile and the Hiptop for Telstra.
@Jordan please don’t try to speak for “half of phandroids”. Everything you list would be nice but you’re forgetting two giant issues. 1. Open source 2. No way MS has as many free apps..
Holy crap I quoted you wrong and its worse then I said. Most not half? You’re out of your mind.
I’m a big fan of android but as someone has mentioned, the quality of apps on the iphone platform is much better. Android as an OS and the corresponding apps really need to step up in terms of quality. I dont consider windows phone 7 as a big threat to android but thats my personal opinion. The real threat is Web OS 2 if launched with hardware like the EVO or the Desire HD.
I’m not switching. Thanks for the rant though, one thing the internet needs is more angry ranting.
Ironic, he complains about apps not coming first to Android, but then talks about switching to Windows Fail Phone 7. Lmao, enjoy the selection of 30 apps over there. I’ll stick with Android’s 100,000 selection.
To sum up number 2’s rant:
Android isn’t as polished or gets app priority like the iPhone, so I’m switching to Windows Phone 7! Who’s with me??
i would play with wp7…i wouldnt stay with wp7.
android is working on getting more polished.
other than that i have my perfect OS.
-Former winmo guy of 10+ years.
Obviously iOS is getting the priority for Apps, why wouldn’t they? A lot of the app developers started on Apple first and then started porting their work onto the Android. If i was going to make an app, i would start with getting an iOS version out before Android since that is where the money is at. Its the same reason why 95% of viruses are made for Windows machines, because that is where the userbase is at.
Meh. With 3 revisions of Android due to hit within 1 year. Gingerbread, Honeycomb and Ice Cream(?), I don’t see a reason to worry. Gingerbread will bring some niceties and more stability and hopefully nice little performance tweaks and some new API goodness. Honeycomb while being targeted for tablets may make an appearance on high resolution phones. Ice Cream while rumored to be released Q4/2011 is still an unknown but I am sure Google will do something spectacular with it as well.
If you have been using Android since 1.5 the improvements made in 2.2 is astounding. Now we are getting 3 revisions in a year which should raise the bar even more. Ooh and one last thing. Let’s not forget tge Tegra 2 phones and tablets coming out which will, by default, allow software and game developers to do a lot more with the added power that this SoC brings to the table.
“No way MS has as many free apps..”…Rule in life…you don’t get something for nothing. Many apps are flakey, poor quality or simply don’t run. The Apps with ads suck big time. I think WinMo7 will be a crediable challenge to Android if they can ensure quality apps in their store.
@ Jordan… uhh… not sure if you looked but that’s not at all what MS is doing with WP7…
@Jordan,
I disagree that “apps crash a lot”.
I’ve rooted my phone, regularly install different ROMs, and test many different apps and I wouldn’t say that they crash a lot. Its very, very, rare to have any errors at all, the only real problems I’ve had (apart from the bad Facebook app update a while ago) was with an app called SuperMonoFroyoPro that has a re-written Bluetooth stack.
I do agree that most apps get developed for the iPhone first, hopefully as Android gets more popular developers will move their focus from the iPhone to Android.
I dont think Microsoft will ever catch up with Android or the iPhone. I cant see WP7 being a popular mass market phone, the UI and its features such as Xbox and Zune are much too ‘geeky’ for a mainstream customer, such as a ‘soccer mom’ / businessman / middle aged and older demographic. Zune and Xbox only have appeal to a very small demographic.
I had far many more random problems on my Stock iPhone than my Android handsets. My iPhone would randomly need to be plugged in because it randomly just lost settings, OS, etc etc. And 100%… 100% of my friends with iPhones have had strange issues with theirs. That’s why I went to Android in the first place.
The only time my phone has ever “crashed” is when I installed something not supported by the kernel, which is basically my fault anyways because I know its not. lol I’m just a stubborn nerd.
WinPho7 does look interesting. The Dell units look especially promising.
WinMo5 was my first smartphone and that phone still works and in fact replaced my friends iPhone 3gs that died on her. Yes, that 2005 unit replaced the so called God Phone until she can get a newer phone. She still wants a iPhone 4… lol
I think what Alexander meant was that those who switched from apple to android and had a positive expierience are just as likely to switch from android to Win7
I’m not even interested in trying Windows again. For me Android has proved to be much more flexible, user friendly, and customizable. Apps, free Google navigation, notification system, Google cloud, widgets and all the other goodies etc…I’m just in love with my rooted Hero and imo a switch back to Windows would be idiotic unless you’re someone who simpy has a smarphone just to say they have one but doesn’t use it as one. I’m sticking with Android for the long haul and ‘most’ of my friends and family are just as enthusiastic.
Google deserves that money. Google doesn’t tell consumers what they want, the consumers tell Google what they want.
@Jordan Your crashing problems are, in fact, 100% because of your manufacturer’s UI. I support many mobile devices for my job and the Motorola Droids are by far, the most flaky and unreliable of any Android based devices we have in our environment.
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I own a Nexus One running Cyanogen nightlies and it works flawlessly… until there is a bug released in the firmware, of course. But this has everything to do with the development, not the OS, itself. That which makes Android great, also can be it’s greatest weakness, and that is its openness. Anyone and their mother can get in there and make it better, but they can also release buggy firmware (Moto/Samsung).
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I carry an iPhone4 as my work phone, and going to that from Android was like being demoted.
Former user of that piece of crap winmo 6.1. I would rather switch back to a feature phone then buy a ms phone. Long live android.
Hi I am Hannah montana and I really love android, for me its all about the screen lag!
Go back to the Apple forums, Hannah.
Posted from 1.25GHz Droid with no screen lag..