[SmokingJoe]

A consortium of powerful companies (Google, Dell, Intel), including many established in the phone business (Motorola, Qualcomm, TI, Samsung, LG, T-Mobile, Sony Ericsson, Toshiba, Sprint, China Mobile, NTT DoCoMo, Vodafone) produces and manages the OS and makes sure it gets to phones manufactured most of the powerful, established phone makers (LG, Motorola, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, etc.), plus a newer big one (HTC), who have existing sales agreements with all of the major carriers in the world.

Say tell me...exactly how much sales has Dell ever had in cell phones of any kind?
What about Intel? How much sales have Intel chips ever had in the smartphone business?
And while we are about it before Google entered the smartphone business 2 years ago, what sales had Google ever had in the cell phone/smartphone business?
And before we forget, two years ago, didn't Nokia control close to 50% of all cell phones(and way over 50% of smartphones) sold on the planet? And has Nokia ever used Android? Nope.
Yet Android, from standing start just 2 years ago, is busy clobbering apple every quarter in smartphone sales. Two years ago, no one even believed such a thing was possible. After all, Windows Mobile had all these firms you mention, and still got nowhere. This stunning performance by Android (886% increase in sales abd overtaking the iPhone worldwide and overtaking RIM in the US), is by far the single most impressive thing I have seen in smartphone sales ever. And the beating on the iPhone market share is only going to get worse.

[antiRepublicrat]

Say tell me...exactly how much sales has Dell ever had in cell phones of any kind? What about Intel? How much sales have Intel chips ever had in the smartphone business?

I'm not sure about Dell, but Intel provides graphics tech for many cell phones, and will come out with a large line of cell phone platforms next year. So what do you say about the combined power of these companies in the phone industry?

• China Mobile
• Broadcom
• Qualcomm
• Synaptics
• TI
• LG
• Motorola
• HTC
• Samsung
• Vodafone (Verizon)
• Sony Ericsson
• Toshiba
• ARM
• Marvell
• nVidia

And before we forget, two years ago, didn't Nokia control close to 50% of all cell phones(and way over 50% of smartphones) sold on the planet?

So true. Also true is that Android consortium companies provide the parts that go into Nokia phones. For example, the N900 runs on a TI chip. RIM uses Qualcomm and Marvell. Apple uses Samsung. They all use ARM. Samsung probably makes all of their OLED screens, and odds are that one of the Android companies makes their flash memory.

Two years ago, no one even believed such a thing was possible

Only people who were absolutely clueless. Much of the big muscle in the phone industry banded together as the Open Handset Alliance before the first Android phone even shipped. Shortly after they got even more heavies on board. Android only had to not totally suck in order to be a big success.