Google's Schmidt predicts developers will prioritize Android over iOS in 6 months

Posted:
in iPhone edited January 2014
Google Chairman Eric Schmidt has said he believes mobile developers will prioritize the Android platform over Apple's iOS in the next six months, as the market shifts away from iPhone-centric development.



Schmidt made the comments in Paris, at the LeWeb conference, on Wednesday, according to CNet. He said he believes the high volume of Android shipments, which has given Google the largest share of worldwide smartphone sales, will win over developers.



"Ultimately, application vendors are driven by volume, and volume is favored by the open approach Google is taking," Schmidt said. "There are so many manufacturers working to deliver Android phones globally. Whether you like Android or not, you will support that platform, and maybe you'll even deliver it first."



After one audience member complained that mobile applications frequently appear on Apple's iOS App Store first, Schmidt then went on to predict that six months from now the roles will be reversed. He said he believes Android 4.0, known by its code name Ice Cream Sandwich, will put Android in the leadership position for application developers.



While Android may be leading in current activations, one category where it lags behind Apple is developer revenue. One study publicized last month estimated that Apple's iOS platform takes in about 90 percent of all dollars spent on mobile devices, while Google's Android market has generated about 7 percent of the gross revenue of the iOS App Store.



Earlier this year, Canalys estimated that mobile application stores will top $14 billion in direct revenue in 2012. While the volume of applications downloaded on Android is expected to surpass the iOS App Store, iOS is expected to generate $2.86 billion in application revenue by 2016, compared to just $1.5 billion on Android.







Schmidt also revealed on Wednesday that about 200 million Android phones have been activated to date, and 550,000 new devices are activated daily. In comparison, Apple executives revealed in October that sales of iOS devices, which include the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch, surpassed a quarter of a billion last quarter.



Schmidt also reportedly declined to comment on whether Google's Android has copied iOS features. But he did state that "Android was founded before the iPhone was."



Development of Android began before Apple introduced the iPhone, when the mobile operating system was seen as a challenger to the then-market-leading Research in Motion BlackBerry lineup. But changes to Android, including the addition of a touch-centric interface, led Apple co-founder Steve Jobs to accuse Google of stealing from iOS. Jobs said to biographer Walter Isaacson that he would spend his "last dying breath" fighting Android, as he believed it was a "stolen product."
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 170
    Isn't it nice to be in a position where even being dead-wrong has no consequences?
  • Reply 2 of 170
    mystigomystigo Posts: 183member
    My company won't be. Android remains an afterthought here. The tools are atrocious and nobody wants to work with them. Somebody will eventually draw the short straw though.
  • Reply 3 of 170
    If volume was the only problem, this would be true. However, if it is the fact that many android users don't spend money on apps, the last thing they need is more users who don't spend money on apps.
  • Reply 4 of 170
    This guy should stop getting high IMO!
  • Reply 5 of 170
    What's so special about Ice Cream Sandwich when it comes to development? The vast majority of those 200 million Android devices won't ever see ICS anyway, so nothing will change with development for them.



    Let's not forget these predictions have been made rather consistently for several years now. They've never been true.
  • Reply 6 of 170
    sflocalsflocal Posts: 6,092member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jbruni View Post


    Isn't it nice to be in a position where even being dead-wrong has no consequences?



    Like politicians, I think this will come back to haunt him.



    There is next to no money to be made off of Android. Development tools suck. The consumer base thinks anything above free is too expensive, and fragmentation is best left for another thread.
  • Reply 7 of 170
    They don't have to make more money they already got it . Android is a big mistake. As a developer I would love to release 50 different versions of my app to support the 50 different or more Android devices. I don't think so. Google also predicted that Google+ would crush Facebook too. I think the problem with Android they didn't standardize it. Every device has a different UI of Android.
  • Reply 8 of 170
    ivladivlad Posts: 742member
    Google should join the HP club and learn the lessons from TouchPad failure. Best tech-lesson ever.
  • Reply 9 of 170
    irelandireland Posts: 17,798member
    Milk disagrees.
  • Reply 10 of 170
    jetzjetz Posts: 1,293member
    There'll be lots of comments about how Android is unprofitable for developers and such. Whatever. All this talk is reminiscent of all the threads that said Android would never ever outsell the iPhone (and later when the goalpost moved iOS). Even the supporting arguments have changed. It used to be that nobody would ever want or buy an Android device. Now the argument is that those who buy thme are cheapskates. I'm probably missing a few more stereotypes in here. Others will add them I'm sure.



    I dunno if Schmidt is right, but I would certainly like to see some balance. More devleopers being platform agnostic would be nice. As a consumer, I don't really like having to buy certain hardware just to run certain software. I'd hope that some day they go one step further and allow somebody who bought an app on iOS to get the same app free on Android or vice versa (iTunes Match for apps?).
  • Reply 11 of 170
    cmvsmcmvsm Posts: 204member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by stargatesg1 View Post


    They don't have to make more money they already got it . Android is a big mistake. As a developer I would love to release 50 different versions of my app to support the 50 different or more Android devices. I don't think so. Google also predicted that Google+ would crush Facebook too. I think the problem with Android they didn't standardize it. Every device has a different UI of Android.



    ^^^THIS^^^



    Android may roll market share by the sheer volume of phones, however, if every platform is a little different from the next, which makes a nightmare scenario for any developer, then sheer volume will matter very little.
  • Reply 12 of 170
    I'd like to put money on that.



    He's wrong. Verizon doesn't even want to release the Nexus from the looks of it. While 4.0 seems nice, and Android is catching up in quality apps (albeit slowly), there's no effing way this would happen in 6 months, if ever.
  • Reply 13 of 170
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by rcoleman1 View Post


    This guy should stop getting high IMO!



    Funny! Made smile, thx!
  • Reply 14 of 170
    maestro64maestro64 Posts: 5,043member
    The exact thing Eric is pointing at as the reason more develop will flock to Andriod which is "more hardware shipping with android" is the exact reason many develops are avoiding it.



    Too many hardware platforms to worry about and deal with. Even new platform that comes out have different specs like screen size memory allocation, processors and the list goes on and a develop can not be guaranty because they tested it on one platform it will work on every other platform out there.



    This is a classic example of its strength is its weakness, As M$ about that problem.
  • Reply 15 of 170
    Hackers, and antii-hackers make up the bulk of the "developers" who will prioritise Android over iOS in 6 months
  • Reply 16 of 170
    To the untrained eye Android is awesome, maybe. But to us in the know we know that Google just uses Android for mobile advertising. And the Android OEMS are only stuffing that free, off the shelf OS up generic hardware. The game played by the OEMS is to sell new phones every quarter no matter what.

    S*** Eric!
  • Reply 17 of 170
    solipsismxsolipsismx Posts: 19,566member
    I'm sure Gruber is filing this under ClaimChowder as we speak.
  • Reply 18 of 170
    I always appreciate these predictions from tech industry heavyweights. All we have to do is file them away for future reference and later enjoyment when typically, they prove to be simply posturing. As well, doesn't it always seem like the tech wannabes always have to bad mouth Apple when their own products don't deliver? So much envy, so little maturity. Eric really should know better - it's not just about how many you sold, but the amount of profit you get on each sale. Same is true for mobile developers; they'll always go where the money is for them. Just the usual PR spin for the "folks".
  • Reply 19 of 170
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by halfyearsun View Post


    If volume was the only problem, this would be true. However, if it is the fact that many android users don't spend money on apps, the last thing they need is more users who don't spend money on apps.





    The reality is actually opposite to what you say in this post. For iOS, it's VERY easy to pirate apps. All you have to do is jailbreak and get installous and you're laughing. You can get any app, no problem, and work almost always.



    With android, you have to try and hunt down apps on torrent websites, with most of them not being available, and when they are, most of the time they don't work (formatted for a different CPU/GPU, different resolution, etc.).



    So with android, I actually buy a lot of apps because I have no choice, but with iOS the story is different.
  • Reply 20 of 170
    The only thing going for him in putting a definitive timeline on this "transition" is that the tech market, like the financial market, forgets what people have said in the past. 6 months may as well have been 6 years or 6 days.



    Funny thing is, the only player that seems to be right more than not - is Apple. For Schmidt to be right, so many things would have to happen - things that Google and their product partners have no control over - like getting consumers who have android powered devices to start buying apps in much greater numbers. Why he thinks things will change just because of a new OS offering - when so many handsets will not be able to upgrade in the first place. If a consumer isn't buying apps now, why would they start, assuming they could upgrade the OS?
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