Well, why go all the way and build an OS which has to understand Android apps? They can just use Android (and probably pay a license fee to Google) and build a good UI and integration on that. Saves a lot of engineering power for the real customer value instead. No user would base her decision to buy a phone on the OS, only on the UX and the available apps. I think, it would be a good move for MS. They're already building good apps, they should stick with that and concentrate on it.
A main reason that Microsoft would want to retain their own OS instead of integrating with Android is to simply stay different. It allows them to be much more flexible with what they do. By just using Android, they are becoming a hardware based company - at least as far as phones go. Microsoft doesn't really want to do that. Instead, they're focusing more on the software and OS side of the coin.
An excellent example is Windows Continuum. This is a feature that would be significantly more difficult in the Android ecosystem...and almost impossible to do as seamlessly.
I think it matters to them because they want to keep control over what is theirs. They don't want their phones to depend on Google's updates when they're living under the impression that they're at the same level.
Well, they could always build their own hardware, but just use the Android base OS. That way they have control over the actual phone and the physical experience with the device and can concentrate on the applications that provide real value to the users. Anyhow, I think the recent moves of MS point in that direction. My bet is they will continue to sell non-core stuff that is not related to software (see the sale of Bing maps technology to Uber) and will focus on software again. MS was never a real hardware company like Apple, and even Google sees hardware as a side-product of building software like Android.
I'm still wondering that MS is investing in the Xbox, but that's more of a new market - you know, getting into the living room of customers. The race into the pockets of customers is already won by Apple and Google/Android.
Btw, I'm a linux guy myself. I'm using Windows for Games, but only if I really want to play a game that is not yet released for Linux - that still happens, but it gets better. :-)
Ask RIM (the guys that make Blackberry) and Jolla. They probably want build there own stack with things that are not possible in Android but they still need to have a large number of apps to actually be able to sell devices.
Well, why go all the way and build an OS which has to understand Android apps? They can just use Android (and probably pay a license fee to Google) and build a good UI and integration on that. Saves a lot of engineering power for the real customer value instead. No user would base her decision to buy a phone on the OS, only on the UX and the available apps. I think, it would be a good move for MS. They're already building good apps, they should stick with that and concentrate on it.
A main reason that Microsoft would want to retain their own OS instead of integrating with Android is to simply stay different. It allows them to be much more flexible with what they do. By just using Android, they are becoming a hardware based company - at least as far as phones go. Microsoft doesn't really want to do that. Instead, they're focusing more on the software and OS side of the coin.
An excellent example is Windows Continuum. This is a feature that would be significantly more difficult in the Android ecosystem...and almost impossible to do as seamlessly.
I think it matters to them because they want to keep control over what is theirs. They don't want their phones to depend on Google's updates when they're living under the impression that they're at the same level.
This is an article I could find on their plans regarding Android and iOS apps.
Well, they could always build their own hardware, but just use the Android base OS. That way they have control over the actual phone and the physical experience with the device and can concentrate on the applications that provide real value to the users. Anyhow, I think the recent moves of MS point in that direction. My bet is they will continue to sell non-core stuff that is not related to software (see the sale of Bing maps technology to Uber) and will focus on software again. MS was never a real hardware company like Apple, and even Google sees hardware as a side-product of building software like Android.
I'm still wondering that MS is investing in the Xbox, but that's more of a new market - you know, getting into the living room of customers. The race into the pockets of customers is already won by Apple and Google/Android.
Btw, I'm a linux guy myself. I'm using Windows for Games, but only if I really want to play a game that is not yet released for Linux - that still happens, but it gets better. :-)
I'd actually like an Android version with a windows-like UI and functions, it would be interesting to see how they make their own flavor of Android.
I just hope that they don't do what Amazon did with the Kindle Fire, where they used their own proprietary app store.
Ask RIM (the guys that make Blackberry) and Jolla. They probably want build there own stack with things that are not possible in Android but they still need to have a large number of apps to actually be able to sell devices.