Open Handset Alliance
The Open Handset Alliance is a consortium of 84 firms to develop open standards for mobile devices. Member firms include HTC, Sony, Dell, Intel, Motorola, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, Google, Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics, T-Mobile, Sprint Corporation, Nvidia, and Wind River Systems.
The OHA was established on 5 November 2007, led by Google with 34 members, including mobile handset makers, application developers, some mobile carriers and chip makers. Android, the flagship software of the alliance, is based on an open-source license and has competed against mobile platforms from Apple, Microsoft, Nokia, HP, Samsung Electronics / Intel, and BlackBerry.
As part of its efforts to promote a unified Android platform, OHA members are contractually forbidden from producing devices that are based on competing forks of Android.
Products
At the same time as the announcement of the formation of the Open Handset Alliance on November 5, 2007, the OHA also unveiled Android, an open-source mobile phone platform based on the Linux kernel. An early look at the SDK was released to developers on 12 November 2007.The first commercially available phone running Android was the HTC Dream. It was approved by the Federal Communications Commission on 18 August 2008, and became available on 22 October of that year.