Microsoft is smart enough to realize that Android has soundly beaten out Windows Phone in terms of smartphone market share. However, this doesn’t mean Microsoft is a powerless spectator the mobile world and the company has been absolutely brilliant recently in coming up with ways to loosen Google’s control on Android.
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Business Insider points out that the latest rumors about Samsung’s Galaxy S6 reported first by SamMobile indicate that it will come with several Microsoft apps preloaded onto the device, including OneNote, OneDrive, Office Mobile and Skype. So while the Galaxy S6 will still be an Android device, it’s going to offer plenty of alternatives to several Google apps right out of the box.
This isn’t the only way Microsoft is trying to drive a wedge between Google and its prized mobile operating system, either. We recently learned that the company plans to pump tens of millions of dollars into Cyanogen, the developer of a popular Android fork whose CEO recently said that it’s his company’s goal to “take Android away from Google.”
On top of all this, Microsoft has been putting a lot of resources into mobile app development lately. Its Outlook mobile app has been hailed by some as a superior alternative to Google’s Gmail app and it just spent a big chunk of change buying up popular calendar app Sunrise.
Taken together, Microsoft seems intent on making sure that even if Android is the world’s dominant mobile platform, Google will benefit from it as little as possible.
