Eric Schmidt could have got Google's manufacturing partners in trouble in the tablet arena. A few days ago, the CEO of Google dropped the idea that in mid-2012, the Mountain View firm could expand the Nexus family of devices with a native tablet that would serve as support for Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich in its latest version. advanced at that time.
Before the news, the market could have reacted with an expectation that, as we have learned through DigiTimes, would play against some of the firms in charge of producing devices oriented to work with the Google platform. And is that manufacturers such as Acer, Asus or Lenovo could see their sales of tablets affected by the idea that those of Mountain View launch a terminal adapted in hardware to their own platform.
The argument that would reinforce the fear of these firms is that by the middle of the year, when Google is expected to put its tablet into circulation, version 4.1 of the Android system could be ready, specially designed for the device that the Californian company would sell from that time under the Nexus brand.
That would make the terminals of other manufacturers less attractive, based on Android 4.0 and with the need to adjust to the update program - something that, on the other hand, is our daily bread when it comes to talking about the green robot platform -.
At the moment, however, there is not much data that helps reinforce the fears of these companies or serve to mitigate them. Google does not make official its plans for the tablet market, and it certainly does not give clues about the possible partner it would use on this occasion to develop the terminal. There are many bets that point to Motorola as responsible for the manufacture of the hypothetical Nexus Tab. And it is not by chance that the North American firm is pointed out.
The terminal division of this company has recently been acquired by Google, who has used the Motorola Xoom as a window to the world to show the dedicated versions of Android developed for tablets - to date, only Android 3.0 Honeycomb and Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, which is a hybrid edition of the platform.
