Android has gained an enviable market share in the mobile space and is gaining momentum in the tablet market space as well.
From the time Android was bought by Google in 2005, the Open Handset
Alliance was announced in 2007, the first Android Smart Phone (T-Mobile
G1) in 2008 followed by the Android Market the same year, Android has
been making steady progress in the mobile space and has captured the
imagination of the mobile user.
In 2011 Google Android made its first major/official deviation from
the mobile only approach by coming out with Honeycomb (Android 3.0) that
was custom made for the tablet devices. It was an image makeover of
sorts. The buzz that Android could potentially come out of its
mobile-only approach move on to dominate other verticals in the embedded
domain gained more noise and credibility with Google’s foray into the
tablet.
As system integrators and product development partners of various product development companies, we at e-con Systems (
www.e-consystems.com)
face questions from OEMs/Product Companiesabout the possibility of
using Android on their next embedded product. There is a consistent
effort inside e-con Systems to follow, study, experiment new
technologies like Android and consolidate the knowledge gathered to
answer such questions from our customers. We would be sharing this
knowledge and our views on the various questions regarding usage of
Android for non-mobile embedded systems through this Android Blog.
In the first blog of this series we are discussing, “What are the
possible areas Android could move into and why we should track it”
Understanding Android and “Google
Android”
“Google Android” – Yes, Google Android is different from “Android”.
Though Android is open source and is under GPL2 and Apache license,
without the backing of Google it would have never become what it is
today. We are free to use the Android source code in our products (of
course abiding by the respective licenses it requires us to follow) but
the most attractive features of Android like the Android Market,
YouTube, Mail App, Maps and search integration come with the “
blessing” of Google.
So if you are a product OEM then you have to get in touch with Google
and discuss the licensing of the Google services and pass the
Compatibility Test Suite to gain access to the Google goodies in your
device. Well this is not as straight forward as it sounds and all of you
who had made products would appreciate the “effort” involved in
speaking with big companies like Google and the volume that is required
to have them take their time and work on our case.
So you can use the Google Trademark and other goodies only with the
permission from Google. You can use the Android source code and build
your own device and sell it, but cannot use the Google services,
trademark, etc. Google does not guarantee anything on the source code
and they are all available as is under GPL2 (partly) and Apache (partly)
That’s the difference between “Android” and “Google Android”
Google’s Android Strategy and why we should closely monitor it
Having known about the Google Android complexities, there are two
different strategies that you can follow as a product developer,
considering to use Android for your next product (Note: We are
discussing only non-mobile/tablet devices).
- Get Google’s “blessing” for the
development of your next product (Of course you should have a good
product and good volume to start with) and get the support along with
Google services, trademark, etc.
- Develop the product from the Android open source and “invest” in
developing any missing chunk that is necessary to make your product.
Either of these 2 strategies (though opposite in nature) requires us
to follow Google’s Android direction closely. We are in need to know how
Google is planning to extend Android to non-mobile devices.
In the first strategy, if we need to get Google’s nod for our
product, the product vertical should be in the roadmap of Google at some
point. If we are not, there is a high possibility that Google may not
be ready to support our product idea with Android. You can find examples
of this later in the blog..
In the second strategy, if you are going to invest your money to
create something new with Android for your next device, you should be
aware of Google’s plan as you don’t want them to come your way with
their guns blazing and make a void of your investment. For e.g., imagine
that you had spent a year or so developing a Tablet friendly version
with Android 2.2 and you were planning a release on May 2011. BOOM !!
Google comes out with Honeycomb which would be widely accepted because
of obvious reasons and kills your tablet optimized Android.
So it pays to understand what Google is planning with Android and
guess its direction. That’s just what we did and we are presenting that
here. Our approach would be to take a market segment or a particular
type of product and analyze Google’s plan for that market. Also we would
suggest what approach can be taken if you are considering to build a
device for that market and want to use Android.
Embedded Systems – Verticals and Markets
Before we go into Google’s Android Strategy in detail, let’s take up
some time to identify the various embedded systems verticals. Each
vertical would have a market, requirements, sales strategy and revenue
on its own. The pictorial representation below shows the various
embedded verticals and the categories them into broad areas like
Communication, Consumer, Industrial & Mission Critical.
Figure 1: Embedded Systems Verticals
There is a thin line of difference between
some of these differentiations. So there is a scope for debate as to
what would fall under what (and that’s how the embedded space has grown
in the last 10 years). Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs) and Personal Media
Players (PMP) are slowly merging into the tablet and the smart phone.
We may see no more PMPs and MIDS coming out in some time. The embedded
space is pacing so fast that product verticals get created and killed in
no time.
I would use the verticals indicated above to discuss Android’s emergence into each one of them.
First let’s discount the areas where Android is not going to be used either by Google or by any other 3
rd
Party. Most of the devices in the Communications side like the routers,
firewalls, switches are going to be off limits for Android. Together
with these devices, any HEADLESS device may not require Android in the
first place. Most headless devices run Linux, Windows CE or VxWorks. So
we would not discuss about these devices any more in this series.
Figure 2:No Android for these devices
Secondly let us consider the area where
Android is already prevalent with some devices and may spread with
minimum changes and fuss to other devices in the market. Consumer Electronics/Devicesis
the next vertical/segment where we are going to analyze Android’s
influence. My next blog in the series would start addressing that
segment.
