Bad news for fans of plurality in the smartphone market, but great news for fans of duopolies: we’re basically down to two now. With BlackBerry and Nokia still (just about) alive, but working with Android, and Windows Phone predictably missing in action, just iOS and Android stand proud,alone like the tedious final stages of a tedious reality TV show.
Firefox OS wasn’t a huge player anyway – not outside of Asia, in any case – but we’re now officially not going to see that position rectified, as Mozilla has laid off its entire connected devices division: some 50 people who were the last ones working on Firefox OS. “We have shifted our internal approach to the Internet of Things opportunity to step back from a focus on launching and scaling commercial products to one focused on research and advanced development, dissolving our connected devices initiative and incorporating our internet-of-things explorations into an increased focus on emerging technologies,” the company wrote In a statement.
