‘Work to Be Done’ Improving Smartphone Experience, Google CEO Says

"Battery life is a huge issue,” Google CEO Lawrence Page said about mobile devices on the company’s Q4 earnings call Tuesday. “You shouldn’t have to worry about constantly recharging your phone,” he said, and a phone “shouldn’t go splat” when dropped. “Everything should be faster and easier,” Page said. But Page wouldn’t elaborate on future product plans on the call, saying only that the company is working on the opportunities.

Chief Financial Officer Patrick Pichette referred to Google having inherited a 12-18-month product pipeline when it bought Motorola last year “that we are still working through.” Sidestepping an analyst’s question about the device roadmap for the next few years, Page said, “The best way to predict the future is to make it."

On Google’s current device lineup, “there is work to be done” in managing supply better and building a “great customer experience,” but consumer reception to Google devices during the holiday season showed “tremendous opportunity” in delivering value with a simple user interface, Page said. He referred to today’s “multi-screen world” where consumers carry a “supercomputer in their pocket all the time” and typically have more than one mobile device. He referred to the “new kind of computing environment” as “uncharted territory.” The rate of change in computing is faster than at any time since the beginning of personal computing, Page said, and “it’s why we have put so much focus on devices,” one of the company’s “biggest bets” in the past few years.

Page cited the $249 Samsung Chromebook as a highlight of the holiday season, along with the Nexus 7 that “continues to define the 7-inch tablet” category, but said there’s “work to be done” in managing supply better and “building a great customer experience.” He outlined “tremendous opportunity” in delivering affordable tablets with simple user interfaces.

Chief Business Officer Nikesh Arora referred to YouTube’s growing presence within the connected device world on some 400 million smartphones, tablets, gaming consoles, PCs and connected TVs. He said distinctions between devices and form factors are becoming “less meaningful,” particularly among desktops, laptops and tablets. Arora said YouTube is well positioned for the changing viewing habits of the multi-screen world, citing more than four billion hours of viewing on YouTube per month last year across the various devices.

Executives didn’t mention either Google TV or the company’s Google Fiber Internet service in prepared remarks. In response to a question about the status of Google Fiber, Chief Financial Officer Patrick Pichette said the Silicon Prairie project in Kansas City has started to roll out with installations and implementations. Google will look at “the possibility of expanding,” but has to “nail Kansas City” first and “debug” the service, Pichette said.

Google revenue for the quarter was up 36 percent to $14.4 billion, excluding revenue from Motorola Home, which Google sold to Arras Group last month for $2.35 billion, Pichette said. Google shares rose 5.5 percent Wednesday, closing at $741.68.