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Google’s Motorola purchase makes the government of South Korea start work on their own mobile OS

Categories: Android, bada, iOS / iPhone OS
By: , IntoMobile
Wednesday, August 24th, 2011 at 6:41 AM

The government of South Korea is quite happy that Samsung, their prized possession, will now be getting some legal assistance when it comes to dealing with their Android related court battles, but at the same time they view Google’s recent $12.5 billion acquisition of Motorola as grounds to start work on their own mobile operating system. Kim Jae-hong, Deputy Minister at the Ministry of Knowledge Economy, said this on Monday: “We plan to develop Korea’s own web-based operating systems by forming a consortium of local companies. We will forge ahead in developing a new kind of operating system, which is being seen as a next-generation product, in order to build the kind of advantage we do not enjoy in the market for smartphones and tablet PCs, which is dominated by Google and Apple.” The Yonhap News Agency adds: “Kim said Samsung had been very negative about joint development of an open OS, but its stance changed greatly after the Google-Motorola merger.”

That last quote is quite the opposite of what Samsung has openly said after Google announced the Motorola deal. We imagine that what they said to the press was more of a stunt than anything else, and that right now they’re either calling up HP and looking to buy what’s left of webOS, port Bada to higher end devices, or dare we say it … make Windows Phone responsible for a larger portion of their portfolio.

Truth be told, whenever the word “consortium” is used in a press release related to a software project, we know it’s never a good thing. Money will be spent on a project that will go nowhere, Samsung will continue making money hand over fist on all their mobile phones, smart or not, and you’ll forget this piece of news as quickly as it took you to get to the bottom of this article.

About The Author

Stefan Constantinescu

Stefan Constantinescu (@WhatTheBit on Twitter) has loved technology since as far back as he can remember. It started with computers, but in the past few years his passion has turned to mobile devices. As a mobile phone enthusiast who lives and breathes devices that connect to the internet, he knows he is not alone with this radical fascination of all things wireless. He is strongly opinionated and enjoys a good debate so leave comments in his posts and he’ll get back to you! Stefan began blogging as a hobby in the fall of 2006 and joined IntoMobile in the summer of 2007. Later he got a job at Nokia in March 2008, but as of June 2009 he has rejoined the IntoMobile team. He is currently based out of Helsinki, Finland.

  • http://twitter.com/ihbrune Henning

    A “web-based operating system” sounds more like ChromeOS and not like Android, iOS or Windows Phone.

  • Anonymous

    When will they get the picture it’s android that we want, if they’re scared of motorola then just innovate! It’s the reason they are able to ber on top & sell android phones as much as iphones so their fear is nothing but fear itself.the day they leave android might be the day HTC will take there place.