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You’re not going to have speedy OS updates if you still have to accommodate for the fact that there’s different hardware involved. Skins do lengthen the process, but you still have to deal with carriers and proper hardware support, then making sure you have the resources to deploy a stable build. A large chink of the development cycle is simply finding and resolving software issues, making sure the software is secure, and ironing out bugs.

3 days ago on HTC in disarray: staff departures, 'disastrous' First, and production problems cloud company's future

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First-generation LTE radio combined with the fact that you couldn’t turn the damn thing off doesn’t make a battery-friendly handset. Then there’s the update fiasco, which is, on one hand, HTC’s fault, and Verizon’s on the other. I agree that the Thunderbolt was a terrible device, but that might not all be due to HTC. Besides, you have an excellent tool with which to bludgeon your enemies with.

3 days ago on HTC in disarray: staff departures, 'disastrous' First, and production problems cloud company's future 1 recommend

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Don’t forget the fact that there are some things in Sense/OEM skins that AOSP can’t compete with, such as the camera. Then you get over to the side where AOSP builds essentially vary from device to device and still require time and money to develop due to differences in hardware support.

3 days ago on HTC in disarray: staff departures, 'disastrous' First, and production problems cloud company's future 1 reply

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While the Asian market is enormous, the United States and Europe still lead the world in smartphone adoption and present formidable markets themselves. There’s plenty to be made in the US alone. Pricing itself is a huge landmine, because as a business, HTC has to be able to make a profit and still have cash available. If pricing was cut by ~US$20, that could cost HTC millions.

3 days ago on HTC in disarray: staff departures, 'disastrous' First, and production problems cloud company's future 1 reply

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Stock is practically irrelevant in an situation like this. The entire reason why Sense and other OEM skins exist in the first place is because they need to differentiate themselves and they add features that Google never implemented in vanilla Android. Like the Sense camera and the (read) proprietary hardware that goes into the “Ultrapixel” camera? Stock doesn’t include that suite of features. Samsung sold 10 million S4s in one month. They were all running Touchwiz. Stock won’t make the phone significantly more attractive to the average consumer, as we can see from Samsung’s success.

At the same time, switching to stock does not speed up updates by an enormous amount. There’s a reason why you can’t put the specific build of Android found on the Nexus 4 onto any other device other than the Optimus G, and even then you need to make some changes. You still need to work in support for the hardware found on your device. The APQ8064 (Snapdragon S4 Pro) is different from the APQ8064T (Snapdragon 600) not only physically, but with drivers and various other associated items. Similarly, you’d have to include support for the device’s radio, GPS, Wi-Fi, and other modules. CM10.1 and AOSP builds for the One on XDA still don’t have all features fully functional, and trying to find solutions and implementing them takes time. It took the CyanogenMod team quite a while to get stable RC builds of CM10.1 out for devices like the Nexus 4. All in all, it involves adapting to new hardware and when you get access to newer versions of the OS.

To address the GS4 Google Edition: Google directly handles the updates for the device, meaning that they can work on updates long before the public release of the new version of Android. The only way you can get updates Google-fast, is to have a Google-controlled device.

As for advertising, you need money. Guess what HTC doesn’t have plenty of? Money. Compared to Samsung’s, HTC’s profits and liquid assets are minuscule, and they can’t compete on the same scale as Samsung. Even if you increased advertising, you’d run into another problem: not making a friggin’ profit, which isn’t exactly what a company wants to do. To break even, they’d have to make cuts somewhere or drive up profit margins. How? Jacking up product pricing. That makes undercutting Samsung harder. Then you move on to brand recognition. Samsung is an established brand not only in mobile, but also in just about everything else. HTC? Mobile. And I can guarantee you that many consumers have no idea what an “HTC” is, but know what a “Samsung” is. You’re suggesting a solution whose components are entangled in other aspects of business that you can’t compromise.

As for one product model, sure, your resources are dedicated to one, probably high-end device. However, consider how many people can’t afford it, or have no need for such a device. Multiple devices in a diverse portfolio broadens the pool of potential customers. The Note and Mini lines for Samsung show how a varied product portfolio can be highly successful. You also might come across discussions, much like the ones here on the Verge, where people may ignore the flagship device in favor of another model (As in Note II over Galaxy SIII). You may say, “Apple has one flagship, they’re doing fine!” You would be correct. However, note how they also have a tablet line and sell multiple versions of the iPhone (4, 4S, 5) on the market. It’s one product; they’re all called iPhones, but the pricing and feature sets vary.

3 days ago on HTC in disarray: staff departures, 'disastrous' First, and production problems cloud company's future 1 reply 2 recommends

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You’re thinking of Fox News… Sure, NewsCorp leans to the right in some instances, but it does have to offer diversified content to appeal to many different viewers.

11 days ago on Neil deGrasse Tyson's remake of Carl Sagan's 'Cosmos' headed to Fox in 2014 1 reply 2 recommends