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by taf2 4095 days ago
Do they actually have a good way to monetize android - are they selling phones? Last I checked they had a great search engine. How does the revenue model on mobile compare? Android is different on every oem so though it might be huge - is it really even a google product or more of a Google open source project?
2 comments

Do they actually have a good way to monetize android

As far as I understand, the initial motivation is to avoid being locked out. Suppose that iOS held 80% of the market, they could change the default engine, replace Google Maps with Apple Maps (like they did), etc. Given that smartphones and tablets are now commonly used to access the web, Google could have lost a serious chunk of traffic.

In other words, Google does not have to monetize Android directly, it exists to keep people in Google's ecosystem.

Android isn't a product for Google. It's a channel to route users to advertisements.