Google and Verizon to Make Android Phones: Bad News for Apple - The Battle for Supremacy
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There are a number of different reasons why the partnership between the nation's largest wireless network, Verizon, and the online search leader, Google, is interesting. Both have major issues with Apple, which happens to be the company upon which their collaboration -- if successful -- will have the most adverse affect. Let's just say that the fight for mobile smartphone dominance is getting increasingly contentious.
For quite a while now there has been bad blood between Verizon and AT&T, which is the iPhone's only North American carrier. That's because the wildly successful iPhone, which has reportedly made $330 million in sales alone (not to mention applications and contract rates for AT&T) was originally set to go to Verizon, but when Apple and Verizon couldn't get together on a contractual agreement, AT&T swooped in and stole the business.
There has also been a major spat between Google and Apple brewing for months now. The disagreement recently escalated when Apple refused to allow their customers to utilize Google's new voice service, aptly titled Google Voice, on their iPhones. Both companies had different stories to tell the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), with Google contending that Apple refused their application because of competitive reasons. Apple, of course, denied this allegation, saying they're still "studying" Google's application and haven't made a decision yet. According to Google, however, the Google Voice app for iPhones has already been denied.
AT&T only added fuel to this already raging fire when the company complained to the FCC that Google Voice blocked calls to certain areas, which implies that Google is breaking federal law .
In a not-so-unexpected move earlier this month, Lowell McAdam, Verizon's Wireless Chief Executive, released a statement saying his company would in fact support Google Voice. "You either have an open device or not, and this will be open," McAdam said. The executive also revealed that Google Voice would be available when Verizon's first Google Android devices hit the market later this month.
Google also recently commented on the new Android phones they're creating with Verizon, though not without getting a slight dig in at the expense of Apple. Eric Schmidt, Google's Chief Executive, applauded Verizon for the company's willingness to adopt Android technology, which according to Schmidt, is unlike Apple's system because it's "an open development platform over which Verizon would have less control. That decision was enormously surprising given the history and the old-line nature of Telcos," Schmidt said.
"At Verizon, somehow the leadership has decided to embrace a different philosophy, which works very well with the Internet."
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