News
Linux targets the smartphone market
Tim Green Dec 20 2007, 11:11am
2008 could be the year that the Linux starts to make headway in smartphones, says the OS’s creator Linus Torvalds.
He told Reuters that Google’s drive into the market through its Android initiative, which uses Linux technology, will make all the difference. "I haven't been personally involved, but it certainly looks like 2008 may be – thanks to the Google alliance – one of the years you will find more widely available phones with Linux."
The other key driver will be the more general drift of consumers away from feature phones and towards smartphones. "It used to be that they were so expensive that, by necessity, most people even in the industrialised world...would not go for a smartphone.
Linux makes much more sense in a smartphone than it makes in a really low-end product," Torvalds said.
To date, Motorola has been the only major OEM to develop Linux phones, which have surfaced mainly in China and the US. But Torvalds believes others involved with Google's alliance will create Linux models next year.
