Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Google's is to make money by selling advertising. They also collect licensing fees when phone makers use the Android name, Google trademarks and Google's software in the phones. I assume their foray into mobile phones is to fragment the market and prevent any other player from gaining a dominant market share.
They also collect licensing fees when phone makers use the Android name, Google trademarks and Google's software in the phones. Is that accurate? Everything I've seen has indicated that if anything money moves the other way - Google sharing revenue on platform ads (and possibly other services) with oems and carriers. I haven't seen anyone claim that oems pay licensing fees to google for google apps and trademarks - I…
"With a high-quality open platform in hand, we then returned to our goal of making our services available on users’ phones. That’s why we developed Android apps for many of our services like YouTube, Gmail, Google Voice, and so on. These apps are Google’s way of benefiting from Android in the same way that any other developer can, but the apps are not part of the Android platform itself. We make some of these apps available to users of any Android-powered device via Android Market, and others are pre-installed on some phones through business deals."
The phrase "pre-installed on some phones through business deals" is at least suggestive that Google is being paid for the inclusion of their apps on phones.