Google has recently been reported to cancel the release of the Google Pixel XL successor codenamed "Muskie". This supposedly forthcoming smartphone has been shoved in favour of its siblings with codenames "Taimen" and "Walleye".
Android Police has claimed that it has multiple sources who confirmed to them that Google is ditching its plans for Muskie, the smartphone intended to succeed Google Pixel XL which is initially called the Google Pixel XL 2.
There have been reports recently published underlining that Google's flagship smartphone, Google Pixel XL, is a flop. These reports came after it was revealed that the Pixel Launcher app had reached 1 million downloads.
The app is only available to Google Pixel phones so it prompted conclusions that Google was able to sell only a million units of the flagship phone. In Verizon's data, however, the carrier revealed to the public that it had 2 million Pixels sold since the phone was launched. Add to that the unlocked variants and those sold outside the US, the number of Pixel Launcher being downloaded apparently does not conclude the overall global sales of Pixel phones.
TechCrunch reports that number does not mean everything. In an analysis report published on its website, it has pointed out the main goal of Google with its Pixel phones and its contribution to the billion dollar wealth of Alphabet.
"Google's primary goal with the Pixel almost certainly isn't to move billions of units and turn Alphabet into a company that depends on hardware sales for a significant chunk of its income," states the report.
Before anything else Google has become, it started as an ad company; to which the analysis says, "Practically, everything it does ends up supporting that effort [advertising] in some way".
With Google entering the hardware landscape, it is particularly aiming to take full rein not only in the software side. The hardware department gives the company a new platform to see how much it can contribute to its main service, which is advertising.
