Nexus One

Analysts revise Nexus One sales estimates

Revised sales estimates from Goldman Sachs are predicting that Google will sell around 1 million Nexus One handsets in 2010. It seems that these figures are based mainly on estimated first week sales of 20,000 units and first month sales of 80,000 units, both of which extrapolate to around 1 million handsets in the first year, assuming that the phone continues to sell at the same rate. 

We previously estimated that Google might sell 3.5 mn Nexus One units in 2010. Initial data-points were disappointing, possibly due to limited marketing and customer service challenges. Flurry estimated (based on mobile traffic) that Google sold 20,000 in the first week, and 80,000 in the first month, both annualizing to 1.0 mn. We forecast that Google sells 1.0 mn Nexus One units in FY2010, benefiting from US carriers other than T-Mobile, and non-US carriers such as Vodafone, promoting the device too, but suffering from limited marketing activity. We assume that Google rolls out a second Nexus handset, markets it more aggressively, and makes it available offline, and therefore forecast that Google sells 2 mn handsets per year in 2011 and future years. — Goldman Sachs

Sales of the device may be down on what analysts were forecasting, but we can only speculate as to whether or not the Nexus One is meeting Google’s sales targets. Andy Rubin, Google’s VP of Engineering, said in an interview in January that the company expected to sell around 150,000 handsets by the end of the year, an almost ridiculously small number considering the potential size of the smartphone market. It’s likely that he was being deliberately conservative in his estimate but at the same time it also gives a clue to the scope of Google’s ambitions for the phone. It seems clear from the way that Google launched the Nexus One that it isn’t a device which the company expected to sell in large volume.

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Mobile Computing: The Cloud is the killer app

Since the launch of the Nexus One comparisons with the iPhone have been everywhere, and rightly so, as Apple has so far set the standard in smartphone design and user experience. As observed by of the NYT however, major players such as Google, Apple, Microsoft and Yahoo are now competing across ever widening market segments. Whilst the companies started out from very different beginnings we’re now seeing more convergence as their activities increasingly overlap.

Whilst the hardware itself is important, the cloud infrastructure to provide services to new mobile devices will play a decisive role in determining the future of mobile computing. Just as choosing a desktop computer is largely a choice of operating system, choosing a mobile device is also increasingly about which OS a particular device is running, and the cloud infrastructure which supports it. Tim O’Reilly has pointed out that for Apple, great hardware may once again not be enough:

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The Nexus One is no iPhone - and that’s OK

A of the Nexus One which gives a fair account of both the phone and what it means to Google.

The Nexus finishes the job that the Droid began: it completes the legitimacy of Android as a phone OS. It suddenly makes iPhone comparisons seem cheap and tacky. A phone running Android 2.x doesn’t need to be as good as an iPhone at anything. With these two phones, Android has proven that it now only needs to be as good as Google’s expectations for it, along with the expectations of its users.

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With the , Google have brought to market a phone which already looks like the slickest Android device to be released to date. It’s likely to be the first in a series of Nexus devices from the search giant, designed to take advantage of the increasingly compelling Android mobile operating system. Whilst the phone itself was the headline announcement at the Mountain View , Google also gave some insight into how they plan to develop their online phone store, which they referred to as a ‘new way to purchase a consumer phone’. This may eventually turn out to be the bigger news from the event, as it’s clear that the Nexus One is just the beginning of what we’re going to see on their online phone store.

Will the Nexus One be business as usual or a game changer for the mobile industry?

The cost of freedom: You can currently buy an iPhone without having to sign up for a contract, for $599 or $699 depending on how much storage you want. The iPhone however, and many of the other phones that you can buy without a contract, are still carrier-locked. But Google is supposedly going to sell the $530 Nexus One completely unlocked. That means that you could use it with any GSM compatible carrier.

From TechCrunch commenting on Nexus One price rumours:

…the fact remains that this in an important moment in the mobile industry. While unlocked phones are common abroad, they’re almost unheard of in the U.S. where the carriers rule with an iron fist. The iPhone was able to break this domination somewhat, but they’re still only tied to one carrier (AT&T). Google directly selling an unlocked phone, even if it’s limited, is a big step in the right direction.

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Nexus One - First Impressions

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Now, of course everyone seems to have one question about the device — is this the be-all-end-all Android phone / iPhone eviscerator? In two words: not really. The thing that’s struck us most (so far) about the Nexus One thus far is the fact that it’s really not very different than the Droid in any substantial way. Yes, we’d say the design and feel of the phone is better (much better, in fact), and it’s definitely noticeably faster than Motorola’s offering, but it’s not so much faster that we felt like the doors were being blown off. It is very smooth, though we still noticed a little stuttery behavior (very slight, mind you) when moving between home pages. Still, opening applications and moving between them was super speedy, as was Google maps, and any area of the phone where you’ve got to get through long lists. Don’t get us wrong, the phone cooks — but it’s not some paradigmatic shift for Android.

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Heavy Google users will rejoice from the moment they turn the Nexus One on. The phone asks for your Gmail or Google Apps username and password, providing you options to synchronize many of your existing data points from email (Gmail), contacts, calendar, Google Latitude (which I love).  It seems to really make mobile computing accessible to “the rest of us” in a way I haven’t seen before… if you are already a Google Accounts user.  If not, Google will of course gladly sign you up, which I think is, in any case, the point of their foray into the device business.

What the Nexus One promises: speed

Examiner:

An upcoming Android device will be bringing the speed to the smartphone game. It is currently going by the name Nexus One and will supposedly be marketed by Google themselves, who are the creator of Android. Aside from the impressive 3.7-inch screen (compare to the iPhone’s 3.5-inch display) and a mature Android 2.1 operating system, the Nexus One is hiding something a little special under the hood: a 1 GHz mobile processor.

If you don’t know, 1 GHz is fast for a phone. Really fast. The iPhone 3GS has a 600 MHz CPU and the DROID clocks in at 530 MHz. So you can imagine how quick the Nexus One is. This device zips through the Android OS faster than any of its predecessors. And with a processor that powerful, our mobile gadgets will really start to rival desktop and notebook computers with capable applications.

Nexus One - the bigger picture

Google is an advertising corporation. Their whole business model is predicated on breaking down barriers to access — barriers which stop the public from accessing rich internet content supplemented with Google’s ads. Google want the mobile communications industry to switch to Version 2, pure bandwidth competition. In fact, they’d be happiest if the mobile networks would go away, get out of the users’ faces and hand out free data terminals with unlimited free bandwidth. More bandwidth, more web browsing, more adverts served, more revenue for Google. Simple.

This is where the Nexus One may be significant. If the rumours are true — that they’re pushing it at a low or subsidized price, and have strong-armed T-Mobile (the weakest of the US cellcos) into providing a cheap data-only mobile tariff for it, and more significantly access to VoIP and cheap international data roaming — then they’ve got a Trojan horse into the mobile telephony industry.

The real message here is that if Google succeeds, the economic basis of your mobile telephony service in 2019 is going to be unrecognizably different from that of 2009. What’s good for the internet is good for Google. Right now, the phone companies are not good for the internet. If I’m right about the grand strategy, the Googlephone will change that.

Excerpts from a piece by Charlie Stross

Nexus One - the less we know the better

It’s been barely a week since the long rumoured Google Phone made it’s first public appearance via Twitter. , and of course have since been awash with speculation over the phone’s capabilities, carrier compatibility, and how Google plans to market and sell it. All this in spite of the only official word from Google being a which merely hints at the existence of the device.

Whether or not this might be a deliberate tactic by Google, designed to fuel interest in the new phone, it seems that rumour is more powerful than truth, and that knowing just some of the facts is far more intriguing than knowing them all. Until Google comes up with an official announcement we can be sure that details will continue to leak, journalist will continue to generate copy, and bloggers will continue to project their vision of the perfect smartphone onto the phantom machine.

What’s interesting about this is not who might end up being right or wrong in their predictions. Sure, there’s been wild speculation and some clearly sensationalist ideas, and also on the other hand some fairly balanced analysis. What’s interesting is that it’s clear that it’s possible to imagine a phone that’s better than anything else that currently exists. And that there’s huge demand for it. It’s clear that many are frustrated with existing subscription models and data plans, fixed-term contracts and poorly designed phones, and can imagine something better. Whether this something better turns out to be the Nexus One or not remains to be seen, but the potential has been well illustrated this week.

It’s clearly significant that it’s Google who is behind this phone, because they’re a large enough player to make a real difference in the market. They have the track-record and the potential to redefine existing boundaries in innovative ways and much of the speculation this week testifies to the belief that Google could be in a position to do this. The real story this week, expressed through speculation and comment on the Nexus One across the internet, is the hope for greater freedom and choice in the mobile arena. Let’s hope that the Nexus One is a step in that direction.

The Nexus One: A slick developer unit to fight against forks

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I played with a Nexus One this morning. The notorious Google phone is sleek and quick. Exactly what you’ve come to expect from HTC these days, but improved by the fact that the carriers aren’t looking over their shoulders and imposing their will.

I agree with Gruber, the trackball on a touchscreen phone is completely redundant. You’d completely forget it’s presence during normal usage except for the fact that the phone is so slick that the ball sticks out like a sore thumb.

To me, the trackball further confirms the idea that this is a phone for developers. The trackball is included to ensure app compatibility for a line of cheaper, non-touchscreen Android phones which are sure to emerge.

The Nexus One is important not because it will rework the carrier/handset model, but because it will serve as a universal developer unit to counter forking versions of Android. It’s the common denominator going forwards, and any professional Android app will be tested on it.