5 Reasons a Google Phone Still Won’t Disrupt Carriers: Tech News [GigaOm]

Check the full post for some interesting speculation about potential wide-area networking scenarios; I expect carrier “disintermediation” is still in the future, Nexus or not

Here in the U.S., there have been high hopes that Google’s Nexus One might break the control of the wireless carriers. That didn’t happen for many reasons, however, and now James Allworth at the Harvard Business Review suggests that Google faces the risk of its Android cash cow running dry. Phone makers and carriers are stripping Google’s revenue opportunities from the platform by choosing different search engines, for example. Allworth points to a potentially dire future for Google, even though the search giant recently reported mobile search revenues topping $1 billion:

It won’t be long before Google’s “allies” in the Open Handset Alliance — the manufacturers making Android phones — realize that Google needs them a lot more than they need Google, and auction off the default search services on the phones they ship. Google may have no choice but to buy their support, too. And it surely won’t come cheap.

5 Reasons a Google Phone Still Won’t Disrupt Carriers: Tech News «