By Dan Noal
It was 5 years ago this week that I got an email from our CEO who had just met with Andy Rubin and Rich Miner at the Googleplex. Google had invited us to talk privately and confidentially about what would become Android. Other companies were already on board, and they asked us to join the small group of companies collaborating with them as part of the nascent Open Handset Alliance. They talked big about disrupting the entire mobile phone ecosystem and solving the fragmentation problem with so many competing Linux based phone stacks emerging at that time. They painted a vision where open source Android would dominate the mobile phone space and migrate to adjacent markets. We knew that they had credibility from Danger, we knew that Google had tremendous momentum and power they could leverage. We discussed it internally, and without much debate we replied “where do we sign?” and started to roll up our sleeves.
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