Thursday, July 17, 2008

China may help Android catch Iphone late in the race

Whether it's in sports or business, the most successful teams and companies  peak at the right time. In some cases, the best rally occours in the late stages of the game.

A perfect example is the NCAA basketball tournament, where a team can catch fire over a six-game span to streak its way to the championship. Google hopes to make a similar rally  in the race to first place for cell phones.

Google's Android phone will be a late entry in the race against Iphone, but if the race proves to be a marathon, not a sprint, Google could prove to be more than just the comeback kid, but the permanent leader of the pack.
 Bill Hughes, a principal analyst at market research firm In-Stat, believe that China's market could  be the special weapon Google needs to surpass Apple's Iphone sales. Nearly half of China's population subscribes to wireless service, and the Chinese government is overhauling its technology 3G third-generation technology that will most likely target Linux.

To put the Chinese market potential into perspective, Hughes believes that the Android will  triple Apple's total by 2012, with an estimated total of 96.9 million units sold. Google and China formed controversial alliances that made major headlines when Google agreed on censorship laws, and that flexibility may have earned them an early favor with the Chinese government.

Of course, all the parnterships and contracts are meaningless if the company forgets to prioritize the quality of the actual product. Switching over to an new,unproven device may be a frightening prospect for the millions of devoted Iphone users who have developed almost all of their daily routine around their Iphone. The China forecast also assumes the nation will rebound from its recent slump.

Only time will tell the true winner.

Posted By Matt O'Hern at 08:51 AM
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