Herbivore2

It has already started. Samsung is getting ready to go all out against Google. 

http://www.trustedreviews.com/news/galaxy-s8-bixby-ai-will-support-7-8-languages?li_source=LI&li_medium=mobile-footer

rob53 said:

Then Apple should win its lawsuit against Qualcomm who used the entire cost of the iPhone as the basis for FRAND calculations. If Samsung wins the reduced amount Apple should win a greatly reduced patent royalty charge as well as a return on previous charges. If the EU can collect in arrears then so can Apple. I doubt The cost of Qualcomm hardware is more than a few dollars per device at the most. 

Baseband radios are more than a "few dollars."  That being said, the royalties charged by QCOM are excessive. 

Apple has already likely made a decision to move to Intel for cellular modems and QCOM is going to suffer in the move to 5G and the loss of Apple's business. It means that they are going to have to make some awful choices. Continue to invest in baseband technology now competing with Intel, or invest in CPU technology and compete with Apple. 

Competing with both simultaneously with reduced revenues is going to be awfully difficult. 

Samsung is likely to be one the few winners with QCOM's loss of competitiveness. They make their own modems and SOCs. Huawei is also another beneficiary and perhaps LG if they successfully develop and release the Nuclun processor. 

Google's Android will be the ultimate loser as Samsung, Huawei and LG demand concessions with the other OEMs reduced to low performance modems and CPUs from QCOM. 

I don't expect much to come from the lawsuit. It doesn't really matter much as the landscape has changed dramatically from Steve Jobs' time at Apple. 

What is interesting to watch is what Samsung does to Google over the next several years. The Pixel won't be competitive for long. Not by a long shot. And apart from the phone itself, Samsung runs their other electronics on Tizen.

With the crippling of QCOM, Google won't have many options left to exploit. 

jbdragon said:

So yet another Google fail that will get little outside news reporting. All fanfare when announced and launched, and then crickets when yet something else of Google fails yet again. Let me tell you, it's a pretty LONG list of failed Google things.

Most of Google's ideas are half baked. They supposedly have all of these bright people but obviously have little clue as to what the consumer is willing to pay for. It's not Google Glass and it certainly isn't self driving vehicles either. Google+ has failed, Google wallet has failed (I cannot even begin to count the number of times I used Amazon one click), Froogle has failed, Google fiber has failed (they wanted free access to AT&T's poles), the Motorola purchase has failed, Nest has essentially failed, their partnerships with Apple, Samsung, LG, and Huawei have failed. They now have HTC building the Pixel. When that one fails, they can always and try to exploit Xiaomi. It is doubtful that Sony/Ericsson builds phones for them after Xiaomi fails also. 

Apple makes nearly all of the hardware profits in smartphones. Samsung would like to move away from Android and onto Tizen. They make the only non Apple smartwatch worth purchasing and it doesn't run Android wear. 

The only property that Google owns worth much is Youtube. And Amazon has built a competitive site. I find using Amazon superior as a prime member. The video selection is admittedly limited in comparison to YouTube but it's getting better all the time. 

ike17055 said:

lmagoo said:

To use Alphabet/Google for anything other than search is totally absurd!!

Uh...no. Their app for Maps is still vastly superior.  Same goes for gmail and it is improving as well. Google calendar also good and improving.  Google Keep is pretty good. And i will take Google Drive over iCloud any day. For me, the Google music app/service is also superior...And they all work beautifully on my iPad. 

I don't really have a need to use maps on an iPad. Apple maps works just fine and is good enough. I only ever use it on the phone. 

There isn't anything that Google produces that I even want. Not even search. I myself find Bing superior. 

I will say that occasionally I will go to YouTube for a how to video. Like details in programming my home automation system. But that's it. I make certain to do the search from Bing too, not in the YouTube web page. 

To use Google for anything is totally absurd from my perspective. By the way, more and more of my friends and colleagues have turned to Bing for default search.  

Apple and Samsung have real hardware advantages which make them the smart watches of choice. As they continue their development programs, the others will likely exit the market all together. LG is the only hope for Android wear as there really is no other capable hardware manufacturer who can build a decent watch. Apple uses watchOS and Samsung uses Tizen. 

I am close to purchasing a smartwatch and the stand alone call capability of the Samsung Gear S3 frontier is pretty compelling. On the other hand, Apple Pay using the watch is a pretty nice feature. Android wear watches have virtually no compelling features. The next big hardware paradigm is being lost to Google. 

Now, if Apple would just put a baseband radio in the watch. . .