Google chairman: Microsoft is still not in his "gang"

Google chairman Eric Schmidt still doesn't want Microsoft in his self proclaimed "Gang of Four" top tech companies. In May 2011, Schmidt said that his own company, along with Apple, Amazon, and Facebook, were in the gang and they effectively ruled the industry.

In a new chat at AllThingsD.com, Schmidt said that he was still not ready to bring Microsoft into his "gang", saying, "They’re a well-run company, but they haven’t been able to bring state-of-the-art products into the fields we’re talking about yet."

Those products include smartphones and tablets. Schmidt has predicted that Google's Android OS will be installed in "1 billion mobile devices" within a year. He added that the company is now seeing about 1.3 million new Android hardware activations per day.

But what about Microsoft's attempt to enter the mobile space with their own hardware product, the Surface tablet? When asked, Schmidt said, "It means a lot if the product works." He also feels that while Microsoft was successful in creating a "structural monopoly" for the PC space, that won't work with tablets and smartphones. He also believes that software developers are thinking about mobile apps first and web apps second.

Source: AllThingsD.com
Girl out of gang photo via Shutterstock