Understanding the Android market in Java

Printing QR Code 2d barcode in Java Understanding the Android market

Android promises to have something for everyone. It aims to support a variety of hardware devices, not just high-end ones typically associated with expensive smartphones. Of course, Android users will enjoy improved performance on a more powerful device, considering that it sports a comprehensive set of computing features. But how well can Android scale up and down to a variety of markets and gain market and mind share How quickly can the smartphone market become the standard Some folks are still clinging to phone-only devices, even though smartphones are growing rapidly in virtually every demographic. Let s look at Android from the perspective of a few existing players in the marketplace. When you re talking about the cellular market, the place to start is at the top, with the carriers, or as they re sometimes referred to, the mobile operators.

Mobile operators (the cell phone companies such as AT&T and Verizon) are in the business, first and foremost, of selling subscriptions to their services. Shareholders want a return on their investment, and it s hard to imagine an industry where there s a larger investment than in a network that spans such broad geographic territory. To the mobile operator, cell phones are simultaneously a conduit for services, a drug to entice subscribers, and an annoyance to support and lock down. Some mobile operators are embracing Android as a platform to drive new data services across the excess capacity operators have built into their networks. Data services represent high-premium services and high-margin revenues for the operator. If Android can help drive those revenues for the mobile operator, all the better.

Other mobile operators feel threatened by Google and the potential of free wireless, driven by advertising revenues and an upheaval of the market. Another challenge for mobile operators is that they want the final say on what services are enabled across their networks. Historically, handset manufacturers complain that their devices are handicapped and don t exercise all the features designed into them because mobile operators lack the capability or willingness to support those features. An encouraging sign is that there are mobile operators involved in the Open Handset Alliance. Let s move on to a comparison of Android and existing cell phones on the market today.

The majority of cell phones on the market continue to be consumer flip phones and feature phones phones that aren t smartphones.1 These phones are the ones consumers get when they walk into the retailer and ask what can be had for free. These consumers are the I just want a phone customers. Their primary interest is a phone for voice communications, an address book, and increasingly, texting. They might even want a camera. Many of these phones have additional capabilities such as mobile web browsing, but because of relatively poor user experience, these features aren t employed heavily. The one exception is text messaging, which is a dominant application no matter the classification of device. Another increasingly in-demand category is location-based services, which typically use the Global Positioning System (GPS). Android s challenge is to scale down to this market. Some of the bells and whistles in Android can be left out to fit into lower-end hardware. One of the big functionality gaps on these lower-end phones is the web experience the user gets. Part of the problem is screen size, but equally challenging is the browser technology itself, which often struggles to match the rich web experience of desktop computers. Android features the market-leading WebKit browser engine, which brings desktop-compatible browsing to the mobile arena. Figure 1.2 shows WebKit in action on Android. If a rich web experience Figure 1.2 Android s built-in browser can be effectively scaled down to feature phone technology is based on WebKit s browser class hardware, it would go a long way toward engine.

Only 12% of phones sold in the fourth quarter of 2008 were smartphones: http://www.gartner.com/it/ page.jsp id=910112.