Google has announced plans to stop selling the Nexus One direct, conceding defeat in its ambitious effort to sell its own smartphone directly online. In a
blog post
today, Andy Rubin, the head of the company’s Android division, said Google will switch to selling the phone through existing retail channels and will soon thereafter cease selling handsets
online completely.
Google had hoped to shake up the wireless carrier-controlled cell phone business in the U.S. but its online store opened to offer the high-end Nexus One failed to draw much
interest from consumers accustomed to buy phones through carrier retail outlets.