Google's laptop move is challenge to Microsoft

Jul 9 2009 by Iain Laing, The Journal

INTERNET giant Google is developing a new operating system for laptop computers in a move seen as a bold challenge to Microsoft's dominance.

The new technology is being designed for those who “live on the web” and is initially aimed at netbooks, although it will eventually be used to power full-sized desktops as well.

Google said the new operating system (OS) will run through its nine-month-old web browser, Chrome, and the company said it was going back to basics with the technology.

The Chrome browser could threaten Microsoft’s Windows system, which has been running most personal computers for the past two decades.

Google said the new OS was a natural extension of Chrome and was “our attempt to rethink what operating systems should be”.

It plans to introduce the Chrome OS during the second half of 2010 for netbooks – cheaper, less powerful laptops that appeal to people whose main motivation for having a computer is to surf the web.

A post on Google’s website by Sundar Pichai, vice-president of product management, and engineering director Linus Upson said: “We designed Google Chrome for people who live on the web – searching for information, checking email, catching up on the news, shopping or just staying in touch with friends.

“However, the operating systems that browsers run on were designed in an era where there was no web.”

The firm said it was “completely redesigning the underlying security architecture of the OS so that users don’t have to deal with viruses, malware and security updates”.

“It should just work,” it added.