Dell ditching Android for Windows 8 for future tablets
Michael Dell announced at this year's Dell World conference that his company will be focusing more on developing tablets on Microsoft's Windows 8 platform rather on Android, saying the mobile OS is "certainly another opportunity as well, but that market has not developed to the expectations they would have had." He then went on to blame the OS for the lack of success for the Streak devices, Venue, and Aero (the company's first attempt at an Android phone, which ran Android 1.5).
Like many of you out there, I'm a proud owner of a Streak 5 and have had one since its launch. Obviously, then, I have to disagree with Mr. Dell. The poor success wasn't the software's fault; it was the poor marketing and hardware. Dell's phones have also always had issues that kept them from being great successes: The Streak launched with Android 1.6 and had a screen that was bigger than the 4.3-inch screens that were becoming popular at the time, the Aero launched with Android 1.5 and only had a 624MHz processor, and while the Venue didn't have any major hardware faults, it suffered from the poor reputation of Dell's previous disasters.
Interestingly, Steve Felice, President of Dell's Consumer, Small and Medium Business division said the products were launched "in small volumes to see customer reaction and behavior," which I don't think it is necessarily true. I don't think that Dell ever made very many Streaks in the first place.
As AndroidGuys's Scott Webster notes, Dell hasn't made a massive splash in the market of Android devices like the way other OEMs such as Samsung or HTC have, and they probably never are. Dell is a company that makes computers, not phones, and perhaps the quicker Dell pulls out of this market, the better.
This may seem strange coming from someone who loves his phone-tablet-thingy, but I think I speak on behalf on everyone who bought a Dell Streak and is now stuck with it for two years and maybe even regrets buying it in the first place.
[V3 via Android And Me]
