Google may soon offer a one-stop shop for smartphone customers.
The company already offers smartphones, apps and a mobile operating system. Pretty soon it plans to offer wireless service also.
At the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Sundar Pichai, Google s senior vice president of products, confirmed that the company would soon offer wireless plans in the United States. The company plans to use the service to test new features, he said.
You will see us announce it in the coming months, Pichai said, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal. Our goal here is to drive a set of innovations which we think the system should adopt.
Pichai did not say when Google will launch the service, where the company will offer it or how much it will charge.
Regardless, don t look for Google to undermine or seriously challenge the Big Four wireless carriers, at least not yet. The company doesn t plan to build out its own network; instead, its service will piggyback on top of the networks of existing carriers. The Journal previously reported that Google has struck deals with T-Mobile and Sprint to offer service through their networks.
Meanwhile, Pichai deflected a question about whether it would use the network to try to pressure the industry to lower prices; rather than trying to shake up industry business practices, Google plans to use the network to explore and test new technologies.
We re trying to show innovations, like calls automatically reconnecting if someone drops on one end, Pichai said, according to The Verge. Those are the kinds of ideas we re pursuing with this project.
As the Journal noted, Google s entry into the wireless service market is fraught with potential challenges. Much of Google s mobile business is dependent on the success of its Android software, which in turn is dependent in part on the willingness of wireless carriers to carry and subsidize Android-based phones.
Google already offers wired TV and Internet service in Kansas City through its Google Fiber business. It also is developing technologies that would provide wireless Internet access in remote regions through high-altitude balloons and drones.
Photo: Google Senior Vice President Sundar Pichai gives a keynote address during the opening day of the 2015 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Monday (AFP/Getty Images).
