Facebook considered to build an operating system for mobile

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Facebook considered to build an operating system for mobile

Facebook considered to build an operating system for mobile; with an in-house team developing its own Android alternative, a replacement to the OS that will leave future VR, smart home, and other products less reliant on Google.

Facebook has been considering its own software system for a long time. Back in 2013, it made a primary attempt when the HTC First smartphone shipped.

Now, the company is actually developing a mysterious new OS for its future hardware products, and also exploring all the options right now, including potentially partnering with other companies or building a custom OS that supports for augmented reality.

The project will be guided by Mark Lucovsky, former co-helper to build the Windows NT operating system at Microsoft.

The development of the new OS is under the watchful eyes of Mark Lucovsky. He is the General Manager of Operating Systems at Facebook, where the current focus is to design a new OS, a whole new OS that can be used for augmented reality (AR) like devices.

The social giant is said to be working on everything from its own AIs to power voice assistants, through to dedicated chips for hardware products. Facebook also worked on a secret project codenamed Oxygen circa 2013 that would help it distribute Android apps from outside the Google Play store if necessary.

Besides Oculus and Portal, the social giant is also rumored to be working on AR glasses, codenamed Orion, that will have a brain-computer interface to control it. The brain interface device has been shrunk from the scale of a fridge to something that matches in an exceedingly user's hand, but it's still not ready to be put in a real product.

Andrew Bosworth, head of hardware at Facebook, said,

“We actually need to form sure subsequent generation has space for us. We don’t think we will trust the marketplace or competitors to make sure that’s the case. And so we’re gonna do it ourselves.”

Designing its own OS will also allow Facebook to deeply integrate its social services in the OS. Also, the company will have the freedom to customize the OS for specific hardware like Oculus Quest.

At present, products such as Oculus Quest, the standalone VR headset, Portal, Facebook video-call display, all are based on customized versions of Google’s Android.

The Mark Zuckerberg owned company is hoping to reduce, or perhaps even end, this dependency by developing its own OS. It could also prevent disagreement between Google and Facebook from derailing the roadmaps of its devices.

For now, it is unclear that exactly where it will be deployed and exactly how this new OS will be structured. But, it'll be interesting to envision where this new project leads and whether its new direction proves more successful than Facebook Home.

The augmented reality market remains in its early stages, and its growth has appeared to be somewhat slow, so it's going to be surprising to ascertain such an outsize investment from Facebook at this point.

If it all pans out, Facebook may soon become much more than simply the 'social media company.'






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