Google I/O 2014: Facing tough competition

Competition is putting the Internet giant over the edge.

There may have been a lot of Google execs gnawing away at their fingernails last night, unable to sleep. I doubt they were pondering whether they're too paranoid about the competitive landscape. Not bloody likely, not after the way June has played out for them. You're not paranoid if everyone really is out to get you, as the saying goes. And if competitors have made anything clear this month, it's that they all are gunning for Google.

This month, Amazon, Apple, and Samsung—three of the biggest names in the mobile ecosystem—all updated their respective developer communities with product and platform plans, and the thread that hems their stories together is this: They're all hard at work shooing Google from their products.

Naturally, all three would be giddy if the other two faded from view. But for now at least, they have a bigger fish to fry. In fact, Apple actually peppered its June announcements with the time-tested "enemy-of-my-enemy" ideal: they picked Bing, the search engine from long-time rival Microsoft, to power Spotlight, the built-in search front end that's coming with iOS 8.

Samsung, the largest smartphone supplier that also happens to ship more Android devices than any other, unveiled the first-ever smartphone based on Tizen, an open-source alternative to Android. And Amazon's new "buyPhone" (Amazon calls it the Fire Phone) sees to it that consumers shop with its commerce engine, not Google's.

Taken together, the developments should sound alarms at Google.

- Mike Feibus
??EE Times