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Telecom & Wireless

Google Android Crushes Apple In Mobile OS Race

Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Published
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Google Inc’s (NASDAQ: GOOG) Android mobile OS is being adopted at an rapid pace by hardware firms from HTC to Motorola (NYSE: MOT). Google also has its own Android handset–the Nexus One.

The adoption rate of Android is so quick that the OS moved ahead of Apple Inc’s (NASDAQ: AAPL) OS in the first quarter of 2010.  Android trails the Research-in-Motion (NASDAQ: RIMM), but not by much.

According to research firm NPD, “the Android operating system moved into second position at 28 percent behind RIM’s OS (36 percent) and ahead of Apple’s OS (21 percent).”

The information shows the power of an OS that is not tethered to one handset. The Apple OS only operates on the iPhone and RIM’s only works on the Blackberry. Because of these differences, Android is likely to gain market share as it is adopted by more and more smart phone manufacturers.

The question is “does it matter”? Google does not appears to have a revenue mode for its mobile OS. Android may make it more likely that people with smart phones with the Google OS will use the firm’s search engine.  But owners of Android-based handsets can set another search product as their default.

For the time being, Android is winning a race in which there may be no prize.

Douglas A. McIntyre

Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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