Google Wants To Design Its Own Smartphone Chips

By standardizing chipsets or designs or everything powering an Android phone, Google would then feel like it has more control, but it also could help them introduce all sorts of new features across the board.

But hey, it could also be about Apple and fragmentation.

A year ago, Google hoped that the billions of people who couldn’t afford to own a smartphone finally could with an Android One device. The company already provides its own-branded Nexus devices with the latest software features and updates first, before rolling them out to Android devices made by other manufacturers. Otherwise, Android handset manufacturers will be left to scrap for whatever morsels of smartphone profits Apple leaves on the table.

The discussions around Google-designed chips, which The Information say occurred this fall, originated around the company’s desire to build an “enterprise connectivity device” possibly thePixel C laptop-tablet hybrid unveiled in September that would rely wholly on in-house technology.

It has also developed Google Glass, a pair of glasses with a screen inside one of the lenses that can project an augmented-reality display into the user’s field of vision.

With efforts like the Nexus program, Android One and the old Google Play edition phones, Google was able to team with manufacturers and/or set standards for the development of hardware. Graphics chips drive AR and VR but could take years to design, so Google will require assistance from partners that specialize in GPUs.

When Motorola debuted the first Moto X in 2013, it worked with Qualcomm to tweak its Snapdragon S4 Pro chip by adding dedicated digital signal and sensor processors.

If you head over to our source link on this story (Apple Insider) part of their story claims Google wants to be more like Apple. As Samsung’s recent sales woes have demonstrated, selling Android devices in volume is one thing, selling Android devices at the same pricepoint as Apple’s iPhone is a far more daunting challenge. For now we wait for the political dance between Google and partners to run its course and hopefully we’ll have good news from the results.