Note to Google: Disruptive Efforts Don't Always Succeed

In a provocative posting, open source fanboy Matt Asay is predicting failure for Android among other high stakes gambles:

If you look at the history of computing, very few companies manage to resurrect falling fortunes to lead their respective markets. Does this mean that once down, a company should resign itself to being out?
…
Few companies or products challenge an incumbent, at least not on its own turf. Disruption is required to displace an incumbent, following Clayton Christensen's thinking in The Innovator's Dilemma.

All of which makes me doubt Google's (GOOG) efforts to beat Apple (AAPL) in smartphones, and suggests Nokia (NOK) and Motorola (MOT) aren't going to fare much better. They simply aren't disruptive enough.

Matt makes an important general point that’s usually overlooked. The Christensen talisman is not a silver bullet: just claiming you’re gonna be disruptive doesn’t mean you’ll succeed. (In this case, he might be underestimating the impact of the bazaar Android Market model).

His other point:

Open source has also failed to offer a disruptive panacea. Motorola is betting big on the Google Android platform, but thus far has little to show for it.

Google, for its part, has attempted to disrupt Apple's iPhone in its apparent area of weakness: its closed nature. Google open-sourced the Android platform and invited the world of third-party developers to flock to it.

They never came.

As Slate's Farhoo Manjoo writes, "Even though it's far friendlier to developers, Android has failed to attract anywhere near the number of apps now clogging the iPhone." Android may be open, but it's not cool, and "cool" is where customers and, hence, developers are.

Which leaves me with my original question: if a vendor finds itself playing catch up, should it even bother running the race? In response I'd suggest that unless a vendor is willing to commit significant resources to a disruptive strategy, it might as well give up.

As I’ve said repeatedly, if you’re desperate enough to be open, you must be far behind. (Netscape creating Mozilla, Sun vs. Apollo, Sony switching to ePub). So sometimes, the amount of money you make from sharing the follower crumbs makes it worthwhile.

Note to Matt: If you’re gonna refer to “pundits like Joel West” (that’s Professor Pundit to you!) then I can call you a fanboy.

Comments

[HereAndNow:]

Several Android smartphones are in the pipeline, to be rolled out over the next couple of months. The vendors of these devices include HTC, Samsung, Motorola & Sony Ericsson, among others.

Wouldn't it make sense to pass judgment AFTER these devices & anticipated Android OS upgrades have hit the market?

Aug 27 11:55 AM

[Zoltan L. K...:]

It seems that Google is relying more and more on defensive strategies. Maybe its a sign of GOOG's core business becoming a commodity or at next for decreasing innovative potential within search.

Aug 27 11:58 AM

[balor123:]

I think Google does this for several reasons. First, lots of cash and high expectations for growth means lots of experiments. Google is hoping to continue startup growth and must continue investing in projects that are startup like. Second, Google is trying to build an ecosystem that makes competition difficult. Google search engine is still #1 because of Google homepage, Google mail, etc all tied in together.

Aug 27 12:32 PM

[Tom B:]

Well, no it wouldn't. These vendors couldn't make a phone worthy of serving as a clay pigeon for target shooting.


On Aug 27 11:55 AM HereAndNow wrote:

> Several Android smartphones are in the pipeline, to be rolled out
> over the next couple of months. The vendors of these devices include
> HTC, Samsung, Motorola & Sony Ericsson, among others.
>
> Wouldn't it make sense to pass judgment AFTER these devices &
> anticipated Android OS upgrades have hit the market?

Aug 31 10:30 PM

[Tom B:]

"As Slate's Farhoo Manjoo writes, "Even though it's far friendlier to developers, Android has failed to attract anywhere near the number of apps now clogging the iPhone.""

Say what? Friendlier to developers? From what I hear, the iPhone has the best development API's BY FAR-- very similar to the API's in OS X.

GOOG should drop Android. It is a distraction from their core business. They need to focus on making sure no credible competitors enter search.

Aug 31 10:33 PM