Google expected to launch its own Android smartphone this year

Google is reportedly planning to design and develop its own Android smartphone that will be released before the end of this year. Sources say the company hopes the move will give it a greater chance of competing with the iPhone.

Google already has the Nexus lineup, which ships with Google branding — but those devices are built by third-party manufacturers like Samsung, LG, HTC, and Huawei. Now the company wants to take control, according to The Telegraph.

“The technology giant is in discussions with mobile operators about releasing a Google-branded phone that will extend the company’s move into hardware,” claim sources “familiar with the discussions.”

“The new device, which will be released by the end of the year according to a senior source, will see Google take more control over design, manufacturing and software.”

Google already sells some of its own devices, like the Pixel C and Chromebook Pixel. Like Apple, the company has full control over both the hardware and software for these products. It seems perfectly feasible that Google could do the same with a phone, then.

Ben Wood, an analyst at CCS Insight, believes Google is taking this step because it is concerned about Android’s fragmentation. “It needs to become a more controlled platform,” he said. “I think they’ll seek to control it more, more like Apple.”

The Telegraph adds, citing a senior source, that Google’s new smartphone “will be released by the end of the year.”