Android Leader Andy Rubin Steps Down

Google’s CEO Larry Page has announced that Andy Rubin, the founder of Android is stepping down from this role as the leader of the Android group, but will remain at Google to work on another project. “Andy’s decided it’s time to hand over the reins and start a new chapter at Google. Andy, more moonshots please!” says Larry Page.

Sundar Pichai will succeed to Andy Rubin, and you may know Sundar for his work on Chrome and Apps. We’ve recently talked to him when he showed us Google’s latest Chrome Pixel computer, a high-end Chromebook cloud computer that comes with a sleek design and powerful hardware.

We wonder what Andy Rubin will work on next (Google’s X labs?), but it’s fair to give him the credit that he deserves for building Android and convincing Google to back his project in the first place. As Larry Page mentioned, Android is now the most popular mobile OS in the world, and has been used in 750 Million devices to date. It is clear that the Billion mark will be crossed in the near future.

In case you didn’t know, Android was once a startup founded by Andy Rubin, which got acquired by Google. Andy’s vision was that it would be possible to create better standards in the mobile world in order to drive innovation. For this to work, Andy was convinced that it needed to be open-source.  The rest is now history. It is unclear how the change of leadership will affect the development of Android, if at all – what do you think?

Hubert Nguyen
Categories: General
Tags: Android, Google