Google made waves with the recent launch of its Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro on September 5th, and they are poised to hit the Indian market next week. In a flashback to February, when we provided an exclusive peek at the Google Pixel 8 Pro, our insights proved spot on. Now, we have the …
For the past few months if people were to say the P8 leaks were from Google to drive up hype, I would have believed them. But at this point, I just convinced that Google is just plain incompetent in keeping products under cover.
P8 and P8P are on preorder now, and Google would very much want all the hype and leaks to point to their upcoming higher-priced products to drive up preorder sales, and not a lower-priced product that would not be coming out yet in months, and may or may not be competing with the base model P8 for its value after the review embargo for the P8 drops. Putting out leaks intentionally for the P8a is just stupid at this point and time imo. Can anyone convince me why this would be a good idea?
I can’t come up with a good explanation. But do we know how much Google cares about hardware sales and their promotion?
The main product they sell in the smartphone market is not hardware, but android. And through that the integration of their other services.
To me the pixel phones serve as a guide where they want the ecosystem to move towards, but at the same time are direct competition for their customers (the other manufacturers such as Samsung). Similar to Microsoft and their surface line
Microsoft and the Surface line is not a great comparison imo, since their hardware specs aren’t exactly unique, and every feature Windows has on Surface is the exact same on other brand laptops; while Pixel devices have Android features exclusive to them and not on any other Android phones.
If Google wants to sell Android/Google services and not just Pixel, wouldn’t it be better to trickle down more features to mainline Android? Currently, the only previously Pixel-exclusive feature that is now available on any Google One subscription (that I know of) is Magic Eraser. Plus, Google now developing their own SoC and promising 7 years of software support for their hardware, means that they probably do care about hardware. (And we all know where Google products end up if they don’t care enough about it)
Though admittedly I’m not a business analyzer, and I still need to sit on this question a bit to conclude my thoughts (problems include how Google would be able to put Pixel features into the hands of other phone manufacturers to improve Android). Appreciate the answer anyways.
It’s not neccessarily about being unique, but also serving as a reference.
Microsoft introduced the Surface line in 2012, same year as windows 8 that had a new UI designed to be used with a touch screen. They’ve also released devices with ARM processors to bring windows into that space, presumably with the idea that others might follow. But those attempts so far have failed. Probably due to simply not having any great SoCs available like the Apple with the M1.
You do have a good point with the Pixel exclusive features.
Isn’t longer software support actually something that might decrease hardware sales, rather than increase them? Considering it might lead to people using their device for longer. That said i think it is partially to avoid bad optics compared to apple and some of the android manufacturers like samsung. This also seems like a point where the pixel line might try to set an example for more to follow. It might have benefits for google, if more phones are consistently running the newest version.
I wonder if they’d develop a SoC themself, if there were a great mobile SoC on the market with dedicated hardware for ai/machine learning. Apple has with the neural engine in their chips, but that obviously isn’t for sale. Google, like many others, is rolling out products that might make use of it, so it is definitely desirable to have. And Google is actually in a good position to develop it, since they didn’t start from scratch designing chips, but have done so for a while with the TPUs for their data centers (where they do care about hardware). So this might be aimed at leading the market due to neccessity, since outside of apple others might not have the hardware ready for when the software/service side might need it.
Isn’t longer software support actually something that might decrease hardware sales, rather than increase them?
Apple already has a track record of supporting their old phones for 5+ years, yet they still make loads of money every year on iPhone sales. So while it may seem to lead to lower hardware sales in the long run, I don’t think it necessarily means lower profit.
It might have benefits for google, if more phones are consistently running the newest version.
Good point.
Do you see a future where Google makes Tensor chips available on other phones? It would probably be inevitable if the Pixel line goes in the graveyard, but for now, I don’t really know. Might piss off chip designers like Qualcomm and Mediatek except maybe Samsung.
I could see Tensor be the next evolution in Samsung Exynos chips since Tensor is derived from Exynos, so the first phones outside of Google to use their chips may be Samsung phones if it ever comes true.
Or they just want to keep the attention to Pixel product, any pixel. These little leaks doing rounds and rounds in tech sites mean more exposure to Pixels.
Yeah, but my point was about the timing. P8 just launched, and review embargo is dropping in a few days, everyone’s eyes are on the Pixel already. Samsung S23 FE launched on the same day and no one gives a shit. Leaks for P8a right now are just not productive compared to leaks about the performance, camera quality, etc on the P8/P8P.
For the past few months if people were to say the P8 leaks were from Google to drive up hype, I would have believed them. But at this point, I just convinced that Google is just plain incompetent in keeping products under cover.
P8 and P8P are on preorder now, and Google would very much want all the hype and leaks to point to their upcoming higher-priced products to drive up preorder sales, and not a lower-priced product that would not be coming out yet in months, and may or may not be competing with the base model P8 for its value after the review embargo for the P8 drops. Putting out leaks intentionally for the P8a is just stupid at this point and time imo. Can anyone convince me why this would be a good idea?
I can’t come up with a good explanation. But do we know how much Google cares about hardware sales and their promotion?
The main product they sell in the smartphone market is not hardware, but android. And through that the integration of their other services.
To me the pixel phones serve as a guide where they want the ecosystem to move towards, but at the same time are direct competition for their customers (the other manufacturers such as Samsung). Similar to Microsoft and their surface line
Microsoft and the Surface line is not a great comparison imo, since their hardware specs aren’t exactly unique, and every feature Windows has on Surface is the exact same on other brand laptops; while Pixel devices have Android features exclusive to them and not on any other Android phones.
If Google wants to sell Android/Google services and not just Pixel, wouldn’t it be better to trickle down more features to mainline Android? Currently, the only previously Pixel-exclusive feature that is now available on any Google One subscription (that I know of) is Magic Eraser. Plus, Google now developing their own SoC and promising 7 years of software support for their hardware, means that they probably do care about hardware. (And we all know where Google products end up if they don’t care enough about it)
Though admittedly I’m not a business analyzer, and I still need to sit on this question a bit to conclude my thoughts (problems include how Google would be able to put Pixel features into the hands of other phone manufacturers to improve Android). Appreciate the answer anyways.
It’s not neccessarily about being unique, but also serving as a reference.
Microsoft introduced the Surface line in 2012, same year as windows 8 that had a new UI designed to be used with a touch screen. They’ve also released devices with ARM processors to bring windows into that space, presumably with the idea that others might follow. But those attempts so far have failed. Probably due to simply not having any great SoCs available like the Apple with the M1.
You do have a good point with the Pixel exclusive features.
Isn’t longer software support actually something that might decrease hardware sales, rather than increase them? Considering it might lead to people using their device for longer. That said i think it is partially to avoid bad optics compared to apple and some of the android manufacturers like samsung. This also seems like a point where the pixel line might try to set an example for more to follow. It might have benefits for google, if more phones are consistently running the newest version.
I wonder if they’d develop a SoC themself, if there were a great mobile SoC on the market with dedicated hardware for ai/machine learning. Apple has with the neural engine in their chips, but that obviously isn’t for sale. Google, like many others, is rolling out products that might make use of it, so it is definitely desirable to have. And Google is actually in a good position to develop it, since they didn’t start from scratch designing chips, but have done so for a while with the TPUs for their data centers (where they do care about hardware). So this might be aimed at leading the market due to neccessity, since outside of apple others might not have the hardware ready for when the software/service side might need it.
Apple already has a track record of supporting their old phones for 5+ years, yet they still make loads of money every year on iPhone sales. So while it may seem to lead to lower hardware sales in the long run, I don’t think it necessarily means lower profit.
Good point.
Do you see a future where Google makes Tensor chips available on other phones? It would probably be inevitable if the Pixel line goes in the graveyard, but for now, I don’t really know. Might piss off chip designers like Qualcomm and Mediatek except maybe Samsung.
I could see Tensor be the next evolution in Samsung Exynos chips since Tensor is derived from Exynos, so the first phones outside of Google to use their chips may be Samsung phones if it ever comes true.
The Nexus legacy lives on!
Or they just want to keep the attention to Pixel product, any pixel. These little leaks doing rounds and rounds in tech sites mean more exposure to Pixels.
Yeah, but my point was about the timing. P8 just launched, and review embargo is dropping in a few days, everyone’s eyes are on the Pixel already. Samsung S23 FE launched on the same day and no one gives a shit. Leaks for P8a right now are just not productive compared to leaks about the performance, camera quality, etc on the P8/P8P.