December 10, 2005
Google and Wyse Discussing Low-Cost Thin-Client PC
Though Steve Lohr’s long piece in Sunday’s New York Times didn’t include much that hadn’t already been reported on Ray Ozzie’s role at Microsoft, it did feature an intriguing reference to Google’s discussions with Wyse Technology about co-developing a low-cost Google-branded PC.
Google has desktop search software and a Web-based e-mail service, two offerings aimed at parts of Microsoft’s stronghold. How much further it plans to go in providing alternatives to Microsoft’s software is uncertain, though it certainly looks interested.
Google was among the companies that attended a meeting last month at I.B.M.’s headquarters in Armonk, N.Y., of the Open Document Foundation, a group formed to agree on freely available formats for word processing, spreadsheets and other office documents; the idea is to come up with alternatives to Microsoft’s proprietary Office formats. And for the last few months, Google has talked with Wyse Technology, a maker of so-called thin-client computers (without hard drives).
The discussions are focused on a $200 Google-branded machine that would likely be marketed in cooperation with telecommunications companies in markets like China and India, where home PC’s are less common, said John Kish, chief executive of Wyse. “Google is on a path to developing a stack of software in competition with the Microsoft desktop, and one that is much more network-centric, more an Internet service,” Mr. Kish said. “And this fits right into that.”
Posted by Mitch Shapiro at December 10, 2005 10:45 PM