LG has had some pretty good success with working with Google and their Nexus program in recent years. Building the Nexus 4, Nexus 5 and Nexus 5X with the search giant have really helped LG build some great devices as well as gain some market share and help take the fight to the industry giant, Samsung. LG built the Nexus 5X in 2015 with Google, although it wasn’t marketed as the “flagship” Nexus phone in 2015, as that was the Nexus 6P that Google built with Huawei. According to a spokesperson for the company, LG is looking to take some time off from the Nexus program to work on their own brand. Which is a very important part of the business for any company.
In the past year, LG has devoted a good part of their resources to building the LG G5 which is a revolutionary phone as it will be the first modular smartphone available. Now it’s not quite as modular as what Project Ara is hoping to be, but it is the start of a modular phone. Something that should have everyone excited. LG debuted the G5 earlier this week at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain and it will be available in April.
Not only has LG devoted the majority of their resources to building the G5, but they are also devoting a good number of them for marketing the new device. Marketing is a very important part of any device launch, something that Samsung has pretty much perfected in recent years. We’ve already seen LG firing shots at Samsung on Twitter, stating things like “Welcome back to #TeamMicroSD” and touting the fact that the LG G5 has a removable battery while the Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 Edge do not.
This isn’t to say that LG isn’t happy with the results of working with Google on the Nexus program. However, as with any phone, building a Nexus with Google takes up a big part of their resources. The spokesperson for LG believes that they could better use those resources in their own smartphones like the LG G5 or the successor to the LG V10 which is expected later this year.
All of this information comes as no surprise, especially after hearing that HTC will be making both of the Nexus smartphones this year. We’ve seen many rumors and leaks pointing at HTC as the maker of a 5-inch and a 5.5-inch smartphone that will run Android N out of the box. Of course we are still a bit away from that announcement happening with HTC and Google in September.