Android and the Google phone

Google will not release a cell phone.

Nope, Google wouldn’t do anything as prosaic as the old folks at Apple.

Since they’re smarter and more innovative than anyone, they chose to create an open mobile phone platform: ANDROID

On top of that, to ensure the commercial success of this model, they formed an alliance with other very influential companies in the mobile business (giants like NTT Docomo, Telefonica, Motorola, LG, Samsung, Sprint Nextel, Intel, Qualcomm, China Mobile, etc). The Open Handset Alliance is born.

Something interesting is in the Open Handset Alliance FAQs, which explain why the ANDROID platform will use the Apache License to guarantee openness without restricting commercial development:

Why did you [the Open Handset Alliance] pick the Apache v2 open source license?

Apache is a commercial-friendly open source license. The Apache license allows manufacturers and mobile operators to innovate using the platform without the requirement to contribute those innovations back to the open source community. Because these innovations and differentiated features can be kept proprietary, manufacturers and mobile operators are protected from the “viral infection” problem often associated with other licenses.