At an economic summit in Tokyo on Tuesday, Android founder – Andy Rubin told the audience that Android was created for a PC connected “Smart Camera” platform. However, due to the rapid growth of smartphones, Android was transformed into a mobile operating system.
“The same platform, the same operating system we built for cameras, that became Android for cellphones,” said Andy Rubin. He explained that the idea behind the original operating system was to create a camera platform with a cloud portion for storing photos online.
Google acquired Android in August 2005, and as they say, the rest is history.
According to the report:
Rubin displayed slides from his original pitch to investors in April 2004, including one with a camera connected “wired or wireless” to a home computer, which then linked to an “Android Datacenter.”
But growth in digital cameras was gradually slowing as the technology became mainstream. Rubin’s company revamped its business plan: A pitch from five months later declares it to be an “open-source handset solution.”
“We decided digital cameras weren’t actually a big enough market,” said Rubin. “I was worried about Microsoft and I was worried about Symbian, I wasn’t worried about iPhone yet.”
The Android team hired individuals who have experience at companies such as T-Mobile and Orange, and began developing a mobile OS to target rivals like mobile versions of Windows.
“We wanted as many cellphones to use Android as possible. So instead of charging $99, or $59, or $69, to Android, we gave it away for free, because we knew the industry was price sensitive,” he said.
In March of this year, Google announced that Andy Rubin will no longer be responsible for Android.
Source: PCWorld