Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) has not entirely given up on the smartphone market. Reports indicate that the company has launched a massive offensive by attempting to convince original manufacturers of smartphones to have its services fully integrated into the phones that are manufactured.
Reports that appeared in The Information indicate that Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) has been consistent in its approach of attempting to convince manufacturers to include its services in the manufactured devices. According to the reports, the approach that Amazon is using is set to ensure that it re-enters the smartphone market even after the dismal performance and eventual failure of Amazon Fire, which formed its first attempt to get into the market.
This approach is likely to pan out in two ways. First, Amazon may manage to convince manufacturers to include Amazon apps into their phones. This means that the manufacturers will have to shun Google apps and embrace Amazon services as a way of making sure that the phones that they make as part of a partnership with Amazon resemble the line of products that Amazon already has in the market.
Another possible scenario is that Amazon may convince manufacturers to replace Android, the operating system that is owned by Google and is widely used in smartphones across the world, with Amazon Fork, the operating system that Amazon built and used in its short-lived Amazon Fire Phone expedition.
But either way, Amazon is set on a collision path with Google. Google has developed a comprehensive ecosystem around the Android. It lets manufacturers use the operating system free of charge to build a wide range of mobile devices. But the company requires that all the devices that have been based on the Android platform have in them key Google applications. The applications such as Youtube, Google Docs, Google Maps, Gmail and Play Store have to be pre-installed in every device that is shipped which has been built using the Android operating system.
According to Ars Technica, Google has in place a complex arrangement with other parties. Under the arrangement, Google requires that a company that would like to access a single application from its large family of apps will have to ensure that all its devices have the core Google services installed in them.
What this means is that either way, Amazon is likely to have it difficult. However, given that that there are certain manufacturers, particularly in China, who do not bother about Google services, Amazon is likely to find it easy to convince such manufacturers.
