Sony's Google Chrome Deal a Threat to Microsoft?
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Google announced on Aug. 31 that its Chrome Web browser will be bundled onto Sony laptop computers, in what constitutes its first such deal since the application rolled out in 2008. Online media outlets, start your "This is another sign of Microsoft's imminent death" freakout! Or not. The one thing I'm noticing is the relative quiet of the blogosphere this morning, compared to when Google announced its Chrome OS for netbooks would roll out in the second half of 2010. That July event led to a flurry of news activity, as pundits rushed to declare that Google's open-source Web-based operating system would first undermine Microsoft's hold on netbooks before expanding to threaten the most fundamental underpinnings of the Windows business. (None of them seemed to take into account, of course, that any Google assault on the higher-end notebook and desktop market would require dealing with the messy world of OEM peripheral vendors, not to mention the question of how certain applications would run on a lightweight Web-centric OS. As interesting as Chrome OS sounds in theory, cooler heads have taken a wait-and-see attitude.) Nobody's declaring the Google-Sony deal a death-blow to Microsoft, of course, because both the Chrome browser and Sony occupy a relatively tiny share of their respective markets. According to a Reuters report, itself quoting a research note from IDC, Sony doesn't make the list of top five PC vendors by worldwide shipments. And consider that Chrome, in the year since its release, has managed to claim roughly 2.59 percent of the worldwide browser market. That's according to market research firm Net Applications, which also said that the Internet Explorer line held 67.7 percent of the market, followed by Firefox with 22.5 percent and Safari with 4 percent. Google spokesperson Eitan Bencuya told Reuters that Google is looking to partner with other PC manufacturers to bundle Chrome onto their devices. Unless one of those partners is Dell or Hewlett-Packard, though, I have a hard time seeing a way for Chrome to substantially expand its market share through bundling. People are generally disinclined to switch to a new version of a product unless their current one demonstrates some fundamental flaw; that very principle is what keeps Google's search-engine market share nicely insulated against challengers such as Bing, but it'll also hurt its efforts in the browser market, where people seem perfectly happy - or at least somewhat content - with Firefox, Safari or Internet Explorer. Microsoft's main challenge in the browser market at the moment seems to be Firefox, whose market share has been steadily climbing despite the rollout of Internet Explorer 8. For now at least, Redmond has nothing to fear from Google when it comes to applications for cruising the Web. |
Comments (2)
Nick,
I basically liked your article, even though of course, did not agree with all of it. Most of your points were well thought out btw.
I have not tried the Chrome browser as that is for Windows, but I have tried some of early Chromium builds for Linux and can tell you its the fastest browser of the bunch. Its not a little faster, its a lot faster, it makes IE look like a model T.
Why doesn't Chrome/Chromium have more browser share? It could be because IE is bundled with Windows, and Firefox is still very useful with all its extensions. In fact, I still use Firefox as my main browser, with Opera and Chromium as backup browsers that seldom get used. The linux build of Chrome is Cromium, and is still under heavy development. We should suspect that Cromium will be the basis of Chrome OS which uses a Linux kernel. Chrome has to start somewhere, and a new browser has to start at the bottom of the market share. But I don't think it will stay there, the Model T, Internet Exploder needs to go to the dustbin of history.
Like Nick I too take a wait and see what happens on Chrome OS when that comes out. Who knows, it could be the greatest thing since sliced bread or a flop, depends on what Google does with it. While Chrome OS is a software in the clouds OS, I hope Google will also have a way of installing GNU/Linux programs as well. I think the fear here from MS is that Google has something that other Linux distro's do not, money. Lots of money to go to OEM's and get Chrome OS pre-installed. Money can buy so many friends in the computer biz it seems. Look what it has done for MS, now its Google's turn.
Nick, Net Applications is a terrible source (a joke really) to quote from, in fact on their OS stats Net Applications halved Mac usage by 5% overnight by using different methods. Still their methods are mostly hidden and bogus. W3schools is by far the better source, but their data is mostly for the USA. Also Net Applications 2 main paying customers (sponsors) are MS and Apple. Is it any wonder that Net Applications fudges the books and claims Linux usage at only 1% while MS internal data shows Linux as being in use twice the size of Mac.
ChromeOS will have hardware support, as the hardware support is in the Linux kernel it uses. Linux hardware support is better than Vista/Seven and has more supported drivers for more hardware than any operating system, with the possible exception of Windows XP. As such, Chrome OS will have excellent hardware support. And should one buy a computer that comes with Chrome OS on it, and decide they would like to replace it with Linux, it most likely will be easy, and the hardware will be supported as well.
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Posted by Chips B Malroy | September 1, 2009 3:03 PM
It's more of a threat to firefox than IE I guess..
Posted by cloudshine | September 2, 2009 2:14 AM