> there is no way Google will ever try to "strong arm" Samsung...Samsung is the Android market, the Pixel line is a rounding error and in no way a competitive threat

They've been strong-arming every Android OEM since the start (Google Mobile Services agreement). ("Strong arming" being closer to Apple exerting control vs. the wild west of pre-2007 cellphones.)

It's finally starting to bear fruit with things like Project Mainline and Project Treble, but the political winds have changed and I expect various Gov'ts to claw back the control Google has on OEMs over the next decade. Whether Google can continue their efforts to ensure a stable Android platform is an open question after that.

I can't point to anything specific since I'm rushing this comment, but it should be fairly obvious that Google lets OEMs do things their own way until the dust settles and Google synthesizes the different approaches into the "official" AOSP way.

I'm not sure any actual code from OneUI has made it into Android, that would surprise me. Google really likes doing things "their way" in Android. The Android team takes UI inspiration from everyone, but most of their eyeball time is on Apple.

Hmm...

>40% of Samsung's net revenue is mobile devices.

Only ~56% of Google's revenue is from Search ads - <50% of that comes from Android - and <35% of that comes from Samsung.

<10% of Google's total revenue comes from Samsung devices >40% of Samsung's NET REVENUE comes from selling Android devices.

It's almost as if Samsung is a lot more dependent on Google than the other way around.

At the end of the day - the majority of people you default to Bing search are going to switch back to Google. Samsung will be lucky to get a meaningful amount of money.

MSFT can't outbid Google because they can't make as much money from the searches as Google.

Except they tried this several times, and it hasn't worked.

Someone in Microsoft is going to deserve a huge bonus if they can talk Samsung into making a successor to Surface Duo.