Image via CrunchBase, source unknown In the effort of pushing their mobile platform, Google announced yesterday the launch of Android Market, a place where people can easily download and buy content for their Android-powered device.
Anyone familiar with Apple would compare this new marketplace to the mobile App Store, but I don’t think they have that much in common.
Currently Android Market is no more than a developer thing, through which early developers on the Android platform can easily reach a “decent” user base, even if it is certainly the first step to provide operators and handset manufacturers (which will bet on this new mobile OS) with a comprehensive set of online software services to immediately create a new revenue stream coming from value added contents sold to their users.
Some question arise, as Alec Saunders points out on his blog as well. Developers are currently focused on Apple which is performing amazingly with the recent launch of the iPhone 3G in different markets and with a huge user base of owners of the new Cupertino’s toy willing to fill it with new applications. Moreover, only HTC and LG are, to my knowledge, the only big players developing android-powered handsets and HTC alone is going to deliver a number of handsets which is only a small slice of the market owned by Apple with its iPhone (and HTC will release Android handsets with a huge delay).
The other problem for Google raised by the report is that software developers are said to have their hands full with the mobile phone software that’s actually available for development, such as Windows Mobile, Symbian, BlackBerry, and the iPhone. HTC is worried enough about a lack of attention as to demand a “minimum revenue guarantee” from Google in exchange for launching an Android handest.
What’s next with Android? Is Google talking with too much fanfare about its mobile platform despite developers are looking elsewhere?
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- Google’s Android first mobile phone; the HTC “Dream”, is to be the first iPhone nemesis? (via Google Reader)
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