Big day for
Open Handset Alliance, biggies like Sony Ericsson, ASUS, Toshiba, Vodafone, ARM have pledged their support for Android. All these members will either contribute to the development of Android and/or bring out cool devices running Android.
Sony Ericsson was earlier invited to join OHA back in 2007 but declined stating it's focus on UIQ- "
the company had a number of horses it could back and UIQ was the one we chose." said SE's U.K. and Ireland marketing director David Hilton. In June, it joined the Symbian Foundation alongwith Nokia but never ruled out a deal with Google, "
Never say never," he said back then. Today's quote reads,
"Sony Ericsson is excited to announce its membership of the Open Handset Alliance and confirm its intention to develop a handset based on the Android platform We believe Sony Ericsson can bring a wealth of experience in making consumer focused multimedia handsets with new user experience to the Alliance drawing on the successes of the Walkman and Cyber-shot sub-brands" said Rikko Sakaguchi, CVP and head of Creation and Development.
Another new entrant Teleca has already started working on integrating CDMA into Android platform. But still missing from action are AT&T, Verizon and Nokia. AT&T has already said they are open to Android in future, but after today's announcement, they would be seriously taking a second look at Android. Verizon has an ad deal brewing with Google which if finalizes should see them stepping in too. Nokia, well, lives in it's own Symbian/Maemo world and has blasted Android at its recent N97 product launch.
Now that Android has almost all the big electronic giants in it's kitty, expect nothing less than awesome devices beginning mid-2009
List of new entrants:
Sony Ericsson
ASUS
Vodafone
Atheros
Toshiba
Garmin
ARM
Borqs
Huawei
Omron Software
Softbank
Teleca
AKM
[Source
OHA]
Sony Ericsson, Vodafone and 12 others join Android initiative
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