Google, of Android operating system fame, released its first Pixel smartphones Tuesday to replace its Nexus lineup. HTC has been selected to assemble the device, becoming for Google what Foxconn is to Apple. “Google has done the design work and a lot of the engineering,” the Mountain View-based company’s hardware chief Rick Osterloh told Bloomberg News.
Ouch! That’s gotta hurt. After spending years building its design and engineering chops, HTC has been demoted to water boy. Supplying Google with smartphones isn’t a victory — it’s an embarrassing end to HTC’s decade-long campaign to break out of that contract-manufacturing business and stand on its own two feet.
Sure, sure, I see your point – or, and bear with me here, because this might shock you, but maybe, just maybe, being a manufacturer of someone else’s phones might actually be a more stable, more profitable, and wiser business decision in the long term.
So, HTC doing manufacturing work for a third party, something that they’ve done during the entire 20 year history of their company, something that they’ve never stopped doing even when they were selling under their own brand – which is something that they are continuing to do anyways – is somehow a loss?
Riiiiiigggghhhhhhht………..
I misread ‘water boy’ as ‘wafer boy’, which I guess would also be correct
HTC Thunderbolt… never forget
How is this any different than the Nexus phones, which have always been from other manufacturers, but had Google’s name on them? I always thought it was an honor to make a Nexus phone.
The funny thing is that the Pixel phones will probably suffer the same fate the HTC Ms suffered, aka a nice and nicely engineered phone, failing to sell because today people will NOT plop 650 bucks (euros) for a phone that doesn’t have a name with “iPhone”, “Galaxy” or maybe “LG G” in it.
There is a small chance Google will spend big $$$ on marketing to rival Apple and Samsung and LG (LG to a lesser degree) but it probably won’t happen. The amount of money Apple and Sammy spend on advertising is beyond any Google nerd’s comprehension abilities of marketing.
Edited 2016-10-06 21:14 UTC