Less than two months after the launch of Windows 8, Microsoft continues to bolster its app store for its brand new platform. However, one crucial company has already declared that it will not be on board. On Wednesday, Google announced that it doesn’t plan to develop any apps for Windows 8, including its widely popular email provider Gmail.
Due to lack of interest in the platform, Google is deciding to pass on creating applications for Microsoft’s new software. Clay Bavor, Google’s product management director for Google Apps, said that the search engine giant is “very careful” about where it invests its time and resources. As Slash Gear reports, Google said it only plans to go where the users are, and users “are not on Windows Phone or Windows 8.”
Although Google hasn’t expressed interest in developing for Windows 8 at the moment, the company could change its mind if its user base grows, Bavor said. Much of Google’s time and resources are put toward improving its existing Android and iOS products, and the company is expected to further that notion come 2013. Bavor said that the new year will mark a time when Google makes “big investments” in its mobile properties. Bavor also added that the company’s current apps are merely “first versions” of what’s to come.
While Windows 8 users will still be able to access Gmail and other Google apps through their Web browser, they will not get the same user experience that comes with a native application. Windows 8 sales haven’t been phenomenal thus far, as Microsoft analyst Paul Thurrott has written that some of his sources said the new OS isn’t hitting Redmond’s targets. According to the Windows aficionado, Microsoft is putting some blame on the OEMs for not delivering more inspiring hardware for its new platform.
Microsoft’s Surface tablet hasn’t exactly been flying off the shelves either. Earlier in December, brokerage firm Detwiler Fenton estimated that sales of the company’s first self-branded tablet would fall below one million units this quarter. Windows Phone 8 may be seeing the most positive reception of Microsoft’s recently launched platforms. Analysts predict that by 2016, Microsoft’s mobile platform will account for 11.4 percent of the mobile market - a major jump from its current 2.6 percent ownership in the market. This is a 71.3 percent increase, and the projected percentage only falls a few numbers below Apple’s iOS standings at 18.8 percent.
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