Google Android – Trend or Fad?

Speaking at Mobile Monday in Taipei, Opera’s chief strategy officer Rolf Assev questioned whether handset makers would tire of “being so deep in Google’s pockets” and mused about whether the browser would become the ultimate mobile operating system to combat software fragmentation.
Everything that has a screen is being connected to the internet and therefore, a browser is a good thing to have,” joked Assev, adding that fragmentation and closed apps on smartphones was detrimental to developers and unhelpful to consumers in the long run, especially in terms of wanting to switch phones.
Using the browser, said Assev, would solve the problem, proclaiming confidently, “Browsers will be the next big thing in mobile phones.”
Discussing the plague of “walled gardens,” Assev snidely remarked that Steve Jobs even had his own walled garden “he decides who goes on in and who stays out,” he said.
But attacking Apple didn’t make the Opera CSO any more sympathetic to Google, with Assev expressing his doubts that he was “not 100% sure if Google is going to make Android ‘happen’.”
Assev elaborated, saying that he believes operators may in future reject Google’s OS offering and “feel some pain when they realize how deep in Google’s pockets they are.” The precedence for this, he said, was with Nokia’s Symbian, which had large backing a few years ago and which is now becoming ever more irrelevant.
“Google is not an altruistic company, it’s not about search, it’s about making money,” declared Assev. While this is certainly true, it’s not as if Opera itself doesn’t have any financial motives. The firm recently bought mobile advertising firm AdMarvel and has a deal with Vodafone to bring mobile Internet to non-smart phones in emerging markets. The firm’s Mini browser recently saw phenomenal success on the iPhone once it was eventually approved.
So is Android the next big thing or will it fail like every other big mobile OS before it? Will fragmentation push the browser to the forefront of mobile software development? Take a look at the video below and let us know what you think.