Apple for Autocracy, Google for Democracy

Indeed, Apple revolutionized the telecommunication industry with its ground breaking technology by introducing iPhone and iPad. However, it doesn’t mean that Apple is an angel. Apple’s comment on Google’s Android for being fragmented reveals the sense of terror in giant for fading away of its autocracy in the smartphone world. This is not the first time Apple has embroiled in the war of words. Apple sued Samsung, Motorola, and HTC many a times for patent infringement of designs. It also sued Amazon.com and Microsoft over the use of the term ‘App Store’ to describe its new Android digital app portal. Apple’s desire of establishing monopoly in the market for its smartphones and the related terms has kept in the lawsuit limelight.

Apple use patent as an armor for establishing complete autocracy in the mobility ground. It keeps on decimating competitors through a design patent suit. Its business model seeks monopoly and is feared of those offering openness. Therefore, it says Google’s Android is fragmented as Google allows different manufacturers to use its operating system on their phones and tablets. People love style. With Google’s openness they can get the blessing of superior software packed in a device they want. Apple is looser when it comes to style. Its look is similar whether it is an iPhone 3GS or iPhone 4S. Therefore, Google’s Android is capturing the market exponentially and on the other hand Apple has to see downfall in its market share.

Increasing popularity of Google’s Android is both threatening and annoying Apple. Its frustration is fairly reflected in its language – fragmented Android. Gone are the days of autocracy, people are lover of democracy. When Apple is creating a small habitat, within which users are restricted to fly, Android gives its users a broad ecosystem, where they can explore a wide range of possibilities. The availability of small budget phones with Android OS has helped Google acquire significant share of the market. Along with price, giving a choice of hardware, screen size, brand etc, would definitely help  Google to expand its ecosystem worldwide. Google’s strategy based on openness and coexistence is definitely aa threat to Apple.

Siri – Apple leaps ahead of Google

Developing artificial intelligence has been one of the most cherished dreams of developers and now with the “always-on” Internet connectivity and advancements of communication technology, we are witnessing another gradual evolution. A new breed of mobile speech recognition apps, hinging on intelligent design, has been launched in the market that can operate with astounding accuracy and speed. Though, Speech technologies have been around for years; users found it really frustrating, as they required them to train the software for optimum recognition or speak bit by bit. Users often had to abort their efforts to make calls, send SMS, or search Internet through voice commands, switching back to the conventional input by typing.

Siri- the voice-activated software developed for Apple devices on iOS 5 platform – is marking its success in revolutionizing the way human interact with the mobile device.  With this voice-assisted personal digital assistant app, you can ask your phone questions, receive responses, and activate many functions such as messaging, calling, and searching on Internet using voice commands. This impressive software functions with great accuracy compared to the conventional speech recognition apps and gives a competitive edge to iPhone 4S, which is runs on iOS 5 platform.

Apple has been working intelligently for developing this software and making it a cash cow for iOS 5 devices. The speed and accuracy of this service is now attributed to Apple’s tie-ups with various 3^rd party companies for acquiring backend services to power Siri, which is still in its infancy. As it grows up, it will be incorporated in all types of searches conducted in Apple devices including iPhones, iPads, or Mac PCs. At that stage of business, we can expect a gradual but intelligent decision from Apple to tighten the revenue-related relationships with the 3^rd party service providers. On the basis of the pro-acquisition strategies of new COO, Tim Cook, Apple may even buy major database companies like Yelp and rely mostly on its own databases, diverting search queries to other databases only when they can’t find the information in their own databases. Such efforts will considerably drive revenue to Apple itself.

Apple is eying at capitalizing maximum on Siri services in two different ways: one by creating as much revenue as possible from the users and two by entering into the search business, giving very tough competition to big players like Google and Bing. Let’s wait and watch the next steps by Google to defend!

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