• Engadget, Wednesday, August 29, 2007 11:30 AM

Google's mobile phone operating system is getting ready for a formal unveiling, possibly next month, according to their sources. The tech blog has christened the Linux-based system the "Gphone OS," which it says is a long time in coming.

Google in 2005 acquired the mobile software company Android, whose former president and CEO Andy Rubin has been spearheading big G's OS project. Apparently, Rubin's team is currently shopping the program around to handset makers and carriers, whose various agreements Google needs to establish distribution. Engadget expects an OS announcement with distribution partners to come sometime after Labor Day.

Meanwhile, the report downplays the possibility that Google is planning a phone of its own, saying that Google is sticking to the turf of Microsoft and Opera instead of competing with handset makers like Nokia and Apple. Even so, the report wonders what Google's foray into phone software does for its chummy relationship with Apple. The iPhone maker is also in the software biz; it would be yet another case of partners competing against one another.

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