Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL)’s Android OS and Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)’s iOS has particularly dominated the mobile market for quite some time. Is there any way that a new mobile OS can break in and grab some market share from Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) and Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)? Cyanogen Inc. is developer of the open source OS for mobiles, which is based on Android based mobile platform. Rumors were floating around that Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) is interested in striking a partnership deal with Android Mod OS developer. Cyanogen has come out with an announcement that it had struck a partnership deal with Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) for bundling its consumer apps into Cyanogen’s OS. PCMag.com’s Lead Mobile Analyst, Sascha Segan talked on CNBC about this partnership and what it could mean for Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) and Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL).
Cyanogen Open source OS is a modified version of Android which doesn’t rely on Google. Other big names like Qualcomm, Inc. (NASDAQ:QCOM) and Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR) has recently made some investments in the mobile OS startup. Will Cyanogen’s OS has to settle for 3rd place behind Android and iOS or can it displace one of the top two OS in the market?
“It’s at best No.3. The issue right now is that Google and Apple between them outside of China own 90+% of the mobile OS market and that creeps out a lot of the other players involved. The phone manufacturers, the mobile carriers, the application providers they don’t like so much of their future being in these two companies. So they have tried to nurture, for instance Windows Phone, BlackBerry, Amazon Fire Phone, Firefox OS, these have all been other contenders who have come in, but haven’t managed to break through that Apple, Google duopoly,” Segan said.
Segan feels that the emergence of such OS from startup like Cyanogen is not a big threat to Google. He said that the problem with open source is that it is difficult to come up with consumer apps. He thinks that it was the main reason behind Cyanogen partnering with Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT). He pointed out that Cyanogen did not come up with its own apps, but it had to turn to Microsoft for apps to bundle into the OS.
Google is facing a lot of anti-trust issues in Europe. Is this the right time for a startup like Cyanogen to emerge? In addition to that partnership deal with Microsoft could help them on its way. Segan thinks that Google could use a viable but non-significant threat like Cyanogen at a time like this and indicate the competition to EU in their defense. He feels that if Cyanogen takes 10 – 15% market, it takes a lot of pressure of Google in regulatory space. He thinks that Google may decide to lose a little to gain more.
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