[ethbro]

So this is the moment where everyone with a sufficient device / install marketshare decides they need to buy cloud expertise?

"Samsung will immediately benefit from having direct access to Joyent’s technology, leadership and talent. Likewise, Joyent will be able to take advantage of Samsung’s scale of business, global footprint, financial muscle and its brand power."

[smt88]

Samsung is (and has been) terrified that their handset business will be slaughtered in the race to the bottom of the hardware industry. They tried to create their own OS to give themselves an edge over other Android manufacturers.

Their fears have come true (and now it's even happening to Apple). Hardware is an incredibly difficult, risky business, and differentiation is now in the services/software arena. That's why Samsung, in particular, needs this acquisition (and others like it).

[ethbro]

One thing that I never understood was how the Android hardware ecosystem never saw contributing resources to developing more efficiently abstracted core Linux + Android support for their hardware compatibility challenges as a competitive advantage.

Disclaimer: I'm not involved in that space, so maybe they've started?

[tracker1]

Samsung is in a good position to utilize Joyent in Asian markets, better than most cloud providers, and given the "smart" features of most of their devices, and how much they probably feel they're leaving money on the table compared to even Android's Play Store, it makes sense... doesn't mean it'll work... but even if it only applies to Asia and Africa, where they leave the more firm Android in place elsewhere, it could be a significant boost.

I don't expect to see Samsung take on GCE, Azure or AWS directly though... and would be really unsure if I were a Joyent customer right now.