It's wise to keep your friends close and your enemies even closer — that seems to be working pretty well for Samsung, which supplies parts for Apples iPhones and produces 40 percent of the devices running Android OS currently on the market.
Apple has Samsung embroiled in legal battles worldwide in more than ten countries, and Google is growing uneasy about the Korean company's success, despite having recently commended it on its massive gains in the market.
Samsung holds 21 percent of the market in smart connected devices, says a recent report, and current records show that it has sold 30 million Galaxy S3 devices, along with 5 million Galaxy Notes. Apple ranks just under it at 18 percent and Lenovo sits at a distant third with 6.5 percent.
Sources have told the Wall Street Journal that Google executives have been speaking freely about the risks associated with Samsung's influence. It now takes ten percent of Google's ad revenue, and Google execs fear it could leverage its clout to ask for more, ask for early access to Android OSes, or to pre-install apps. There's no sign of Samsung preparing to do any of this, but Google is preparing all the same. Google bought Motorola as an insurance policy, says Android founder Andry Rubin, on the off-chance Samsung decides to try anything funny.
Google isn't the only one: Samsung isn't putting all its eggs in one basket either, so to speak, as it's been investing in Windows Phone and the Tizen, backing the latter with Intel to shore up its options in case the partnership with Google goes sour, PhoneDog reports via the Wall Street Journal.
Users are hoping to see another Nexus phone spring out of Google's acquisition of Motorola, but Motorola is reportedly working on an X Phone line to compete with the iPhone and Galaxy series.
Samsung and Google are hopelessly intertwined, and possibly trying to avoid a mutually-assured-destruction scenario in trying to differentiate. While the partnership has advanced mobile tech as a whole, especially in putting forth a phone that could compete with Apple's offering, having the two tech giants experiment with different options could mean even more potential for innovation.
