A month ago, Google’s CEO Sundar Pichai, rebuffed plans that the company is going to develop its own smartphone, stating, “our plan is still to work with OEMs to make phones.” A new report, however, claims otherwise.
Google still has plans to release its own handset and “shake-up of the smartphone market,” according to The Telegraph. Google is reportedly already in deep conversations with various mobile operators about its plans to launch a Google-branded device.
Google has ventured down the path of offering “stock” Android devices with its Nexus lineup but has relied on manufacturing partners such as Samsung, LG, Huawei, and HTC. The overarching goal is to have more control and compete with Apple by cementing itself as both the source software with its Android OS and hardware.
“They are concerned that Android is fragmenting, that it needs to become a more controlled platform,” said Ben Wood, an analyst at CCS Insight to The Telegraph. “I think they’ll seek to control it more, more like Apple.”
The unknown device name will be designed by Google and launched “by the end of the year.”
Google recently hired former Motorola CEO Rick Osterloh to lead new hardware division within the company. Osterloh is specifically responsible for Nexus smartphones and its OEM partners, consumer hardware including the Chromebook, Chromecast, OnHub home router and ATAP division that creates its modular phone effort Project Ara, as well as Glass initiatives.
Related: Nexus 5X review: A worthy successor to the Nexus 5X
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