Nexus 6 in H2 2014, Galaxy S6 Still on Android, Sundar Pichai Says

The long series of Nexus smartphones will receive a new member before the end of this year, Google’s Sundar Pichai has reportedly confirmed during a press event at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain.

Five smartphones were launched as part of the Nexus family, and a new one is expected to become available this year, though not in the first half of the year, Sundar Pichai unveiled, Frandroid reports. Previously, Google and its partners launched Nexus phones in the Q4 timeframe (Galaxy Nexus, Nexus 4, and Nexus 5 were launched like this over the past three years), and Nexus 6 could have a similar fate, as BGR notes. Some of the previous reports on the matter suggested that the Nexus family of smartphones might be ended once Nexus 6 is released, yet no official confirmation on this has been provided as of now. However, there is a possibility that Google will continue the series without using the current numbering scheme (Nexus 7 does exist at the moment, but it is a tablet PC). However, keep in mind that this is only our supposition for the time being.

One other interesting thing that Sundar Pichai is said to have unveiled at MWC 2014 is the fact that the next flagship smartphone from Samsung, supposedly called Galaxy S6, will still be powered by Android. Some people expressed their concerns regarding the relationship between Google and Samsung, especially given the latter’s efforts to build its own mobile platform, the Tizen OS. According to Pichai, the two companies get along just fine and plan on continuing their collaboration in the future as well, despite the fact that Samsung has put Tizen on top of its latest smartwatch, the Gear 2. One thing that Pichai also stressed upon was the openness of Android, which has allowed for smartphones such as the new Nokia X, which is based on a forked flavor of the platform, without Google services on top, to be launched.

At the same time, he reportedly insisted that Android was meant to be open, not secure, responding to inquiries related to the increasing number of malware found on the platform lately. According to him, its popularity was expected to make it a magnet for malicious apps. On the other hand, we should note that Google did focus on improving the overall security of the Android platform over the past few years, and that it is expected to continue doing so in the future as well.

Sundar Pichai (Google)
Image credits to techwhack.co

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