Amazon's 'Open' Challenge to Android

Amazon's kindles announced last week, have bumped up the Wall Street's sentiments about the giant online retailer. Not only have the new Kindles been accepted wholeheartedly, it may also pose a challenge for tablet makers as a whole. Ironically, what Google built seems to be used against it. At a time when Google has acquired Motorola, and is looking to expand its own Android device business, Amazon has used Android, and put in so much of its own flavor, that the Android ecosystem is no longer a necessity for Amazon's tablets to survive.

Amazon's tablets have their own Silk browser, its own Android app store. That means, most of the web experience in Amazon products are not even a shadow of what Android is. Amazon is doing another Apple, just that it is using Android to do so. What works for Amazon is its media streaming options with Hulu and Netflix, as well as its book stores which are a hit anyway. Having used Android to build its tablet/mobile ecosystem, Amazon has posed a major threat to Google's own existence for mobile computing OS. Though Android continues to evolve through Sandwiches and Jelly Beans, it may have to compete with Amazon in more ways than one.

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iPhone 5 - An Apple Gamble?

So Apple finally muscled its way and put Samsung into submission. The court verdict was for Samsung to cough up $1bn in damages for having copied Apple's iconic iPhone. A big blow for Samsung for sure, since it could lead to injunction of its other famed Galaxy line of phones. The latest and very impressive Galaxy S3 has been added to the list of Samsung phones Apple wants to be banned from sales across U.S. No doubt, there is no better form of flattery than to be copied, but Samsung's sales of its smartphones have leapt to such big highs, Apple could not ignore the potential dominance of the South Korean giant. The other way to look at it, if you are a Samsung supporter is - that Apple, the most valuable technology company in the world could not ignore Samsung's rapid rise to the top. If Apple had not intervened the copying innovation Samsung has been leading, Apple could be realistically threatened of its Smartphone crown.

The timing of the court order is very peculiar indeed. It happened just days before Samsung's event at IFA Berlin. It has also happened few weeks before a blockbuster launch of the next 'iconic' iPhone. And in this duration, Nokia announced its new Lumia series of Windows phones, and Amazon will be announcing new Kindles and a potential phone offering too. So what does all this mean to the launch of the iPhone 5 on September 12? Apple's gamble seems to be all on one device, the iPhone. While it has been an incredible device like all Apple products, and arguably copied a lot by Samsung (though it takes one thing to copy and another to do it right and better it!), this is the time of beckoning for Apple the company. Snapping at its heels are competitors who are aggressive, and innovative in their own unique ways.

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