ZTE will launch a Firefox OS smartphone this year. “ZTE is seeking partnerships to offer devices with the new operating system to reduce its reliance on Google’s Android, which dominates the smartphone market with a 75 percent share of shipments, according to IDC. ZTE is expanding in mobile devices and cloud computing, where sales growth is faster than its traditional equipment business.” The Google-reliance thing seems to be a common theme these days. It’s also partly why Samsung is looking at Tizen.
Wonder if smartphone and tablets will become like PC sales… just a race towards the bottom, with razor thin margins.
They should name it the MoFo.
Edited 2013-01-10 18:07 UTC
Awesome. The Linux/Ubuntu phone they can call the “lube phone.”
Not clear why, if so many people want Android phones, these guys decided they’ll try to sell something different? Are they tired of paying Google a licensing fee or something? If the customers want Android you’d think they’d be eager to sell Android.
Wait, how do native EN speakers pronounce “Lubuntu”?…
ha ha – you’re right. Hey, check it out, you and I joined OSNews on the same day, but your user number is 300 lower than mine! OSNews must’ve had a membership drive that day …
I’m pretty sure you don’t have to pay a license fee to use Android, that is kind of the point. Unfortunately you have to pay Microsoft and possibly others for protection, I mean patent licensing. Microsoft and others will probably go after Tizen and FirefoxOS too if they gain any significant market share.
You have to pay for “Google experience” (Android branding, Google applications such as Gmail or maps)