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Pixel boss says it's actually an advantage not to have a billion installs

Ric Osterloh, the former Motorola executive who now heads Google’s Pixel division, was interviewed by strategy after the successful “Made by Google” event on Tuesday. Many say the event showed how far ahead of Apple is in AI. It also put enormous pressure on Apple to equip Siri with Apple Intelligence, otherwise Gemini Live, like Google Assistant before it, will leave iPhone users with a second-rate virtual assistant.

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“I should first back up and say: making a phone is probably one of the hardest things ever. It's so hard, you're trying to cram so much technology into a small form factor, there are really complicated regulatory and certification processes, you have to meet all sorts of standards for RF transmission, there are all sorts of interesting computational features required, and consumer demand is constantly increasing. So it's very, very hard to make a phone, and because it's so important in people's lives, the number of quality issues that users will tolerate is very close to zero.

So not only do you have to launch a new product every year, meet your timelines and your cost and price targets, but you also have to ensure quality while being innovative enough to get people interested. It's really, really, really hard to be in this space. That's why there are only a handful of people who can do it, and that's why the people who have risen to the top in the premium segment are people who have done it very well for ages.” – Ric Osterloh, Senior Vice President of Devices & Services at Google

The executive shared an interesting anecdote about what happened immediately after he joined Google. He asked for a meeting with the Pixel hardware team and found that it consisted of only two people. He also brings up an interesting point, which is that Google's relationship with Samsung is very important to the company and that Android needs to work on more than just Pixel devices. Google even rolled out Gemini Live on Samsung devices in addition to Pixel phones ahead of Tuesday's event.

The attempt to take the Pixel line from a proof-of-concept for Android to a flagship smartphone lineup that competes with Apple and Samsung is still a work in progress. The Pixel lineup is not one of the top five smartphone brands in the world. Osterloh was asked if Pixel buyers are switching from Samsung to him, and he surprisingly said that very few are switching from a Galaxy device to a Pixel.

Honestly, that's another great aspect of Pixel. This isn't a product for a billion users, so we can make those compromises and when we first launched Gemini, it was really a choice. The user could decide to stay with the Google system or switch to the Gemini app. There were some compromises, a lot of people chose the Gemini app. Some people were unhappy at first, but honestly that helped us make it better and we quickly followed up with functionality improvements and of course we still try to make it as good as we can. Right now it's rated pretty high.” -Ric Osterloh, Senior Vice President of Devices & Services at Google

However, he said it was easier not having to work on a product with a large installed base, which includes the Pixel. “Well, I think generally there are both advantages and disadvantages to being a challenger and a new entrant to the market versus being someone who has a really large installed base and has to be careful,” Osterloh explained. “Different aspects of Google have that dynamic as well. It's very, very difficult to change things at the scale of a billion users versus a much smaller scale for our newer products.”

This means the Pixel team can deliver more innovations and changes every year without worrying that those changes will affect a billion users who are used to using their phones in a certain way.

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