Samsung Wants Tizen Mobile OS "on everything"

Electronics company Samsung is not about to let its mobile products be entirely submerged in an all-Android ecosystem, even if that’s the case currently. In fact, Samsung co-CEO J.K. Shin was very forward in an interview with CNET this week that the Intel-backed, Linux-based Tizen OS is more than a “simple alternative for Android.” He says it’s a system that can even be used in “cars, bio or banks,” and is not just a “pet project” OS for mobile phones and tablets.

Shin is referring to Samsung’s new favorite open source operating system designed for technologies of vast variety. It’s so far been shown on prototype phones designed by the company, but is being prepped as the potential future flagship OS for all Samsung phones and tablets going forward. After all, it is the most successful smartphone seller in the world, so it has the power to make a change to its lineup — success in doing so pending.

This move would help lessen Samsung’s dependence on Internet-giant Google and its powerful, popular Android mobile operating system. Not only does it power Google’s own phones, but those of manufacturers like Samsung, HTC, LG, and others.

Adding another operating system to the mix, especially a successful one, would certainly toss an unexpected wrench in the ongoing Android vs. iOS battle in the smartphone/tablet marketplace. Then again, other systems have attempted such a feat, Windows Phone and Blackberry included, so it remains to be seen how prepared Tizen OS is to wow mainstream phone buyers.

That ideal in mind, Samsung hopes to launch the first of these Tizen-based smartphones this year, saying they “plan to release new, competitive Tizen devices within this year and will keep expanding the lineup depending on market conditions.”

” We want Tizen to be on everything”.

It appears that users just might too, as Linux phones are seemingly on the rise. The Ubuntu Edge, the first full-Linux phone is currently in a major crowd-funding campaign on Indie GoGo, and has raised a slick $8 million of its gargantuan $32 million asking cost. If that campaign proves successful, it could mean great things for the future of Linux-based systems like Tizen and the forthcoming Samsung phone running it.

If it does not, then Tizen and others will have to pick up the slack.