‘s Nexus line is not dead yet, according to ‘s Android engineering chief. “ople have been commenting about Nexus because there is something else they think that means the end of Nexus. That is the totally wrong conclusion to make,” ‘s Dave Burke told Readite in a recent interview.
Burke explained that when develops a new version of Android it develops a device with one of its partners right alongside it.
“There are sort of two outputs…a Nexus device …the open source code. There is no way you can build the open source code without the phone or tablet,” Burke said.
The Android engineering chief’s comments appear to contradict a report by The Information in late April that said an initiative dubbed “Android Silver” would see the end of ‘s Nexus effort.
Reports about Silver have always made it out to be a very different beast than the Nexus program, a view that Burke appeared to confirm. Burke wouldn’t talk about Silver, although he did seem to implicitly confirm its existence in his talk with Readite.
From earlier reports, however, it appears Silver will be a program to offer versions of high-end Android hsets running stock or near-stock Android installations, sans the custom interface tweaks created by device makers.
Silver device makers would be paid by to participate in the program, the devices would receive guaranteed updates tech support from , would also participate in marketing the devices. one manufacturers would also be restrained from putting too many non- apps on Silver devices all third-party pre-installs would be removable.
If anything, Silver sounds like an improved version of ‘s ay ition program. ay ition devices are popular Android flagship phones such as the HTC One (M8) the Samsung Galaxy S4 that are sold through ay running the plain vanilla version of Android. Manufacturer overlays such as Samsung’s Touchz are not allowed.
ile most of us have called Nexus devices “flagship” phones, the majority of Nexus devices were really more like mid-range hsets—arguably, the Nexus 5 was more like a high-end phone than its predecessors.
The Nexus program serves as a guiding light for ‘s vision of Android allows the company to sell the stock Android experience at a cheap price, primarily to developers Android enthusiasts. “I don’t see why we would ever turn away from that, it wouldn’t make sense,” Burke told Readite.
It looks like Nexus (eventually) Android Silver are both part of ‘s future.
