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iPod father, Nest CEO and new Googler Tony Fadell talks about past and future relationship with Apple

Bloomberg sat down with Tony Fadell at Davos this week to talk about Nest getting picked up by Google.  The former iPod lead at Apple had a lot to say but one area of interest was the relationship with Apple, past, present and future (5:45):

“I have lots of friends, I have gotten great thank you and support. Today we are in the Apple retail stores. We have iOS support and that has not changed…[staying in the Apple stores] is their decision. You should ask them. They have been a valued partner. We have a lot of iOS device owners that use our products, and we want to offer them our products and it is for Apple to decide if they want to continue.”

He also seemed to hint about home security there didn’t he? Perhaps that’s Nest’s #3 product.

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Comments

  1. Tim Jr. - 10 years ago

    I have the second generation Nest. I’m not that impressed really. It’s OK. it has bugs, looks cool on wall, but mostly the remote access is nice… I don’t use remote features that much though.. Probably wouldn’t have gotten it if I had not gotten $100 off gift card for it.

  2. rogifan - 10 years ago

    Can’t wait for Fadell’s media tour to be over. Still can’t believe Google paid $3B for him when Apple only paid $400M for Steve Jobs.

    • Tamal Mukherjee (@tamalm) - 10 years ago

      That $400M was for Steve Jobs as CEO + NeXT OS, which was well ahead of its time! Like you I’m also clueless why/how Nest is worth of $3B. I’m not seeing Nest selling in millions, even if Google sells it @$29 or so. Is it a must have product?

  3. Wayne Williams - 10 years ago

    Can someone quantify that statement that google will help get out to the world faster? What exactly does that mean, that Google could sell more than say, Amazon? And after Gmail’s outage today, I hardly expect good things from this relationship.

  4. myke2241 - 10 years ago

    im not impressed with this interview. he sounds like he is rambling and hoping something that comes out of his mouth makes sense. and come on, nest terms of service are now gone. don’t BS us we all know how google works.

    • rahhbriley - 10 years ago

      Agreed. He doesn’t actually make that much sense. He is pretty much shouting and seems like he’s trying to cut questions off in hopes the interviewers won’t dig any deeper or call his bluff. (I’d like to see him interviewed by someone that knows what they’re doing).

      If we all step back and look at the situation, it’s full of fallacies. If you don’t think google is gonna process the $hit outta that data…I bet you believe politicians’ campaign promises. It might be a year or so, but I’m waiting for the eventual headline.

  5. newmorning - 10 years ago

    A lot of sputtering and scrambling to make up answers that make sense. It’s pure nonsense that Google’s money will let them build distribution faster than anyone else’s money. Google is not Amazon, Honeywell or Apple, they don’t have expertise in distributing real goods (other than the Moto phones which they also bought but which aren’t going to be sold in hardware stores).

    He should have been honest and said he just took the money because it was an outrageous valuation.

    He’s deceiving himself if he thinks he’s got a great brand. The replacement for my failed Nest Protect just went up for sale on Craigslist at a substantial discount!

    Run away from installing Google products all over your house as fast as you can! A Nest Protect installed per US fire codes is literally putting Google in your bedroom.

  6. Michael Quinn (@michaelq) - 10 years ago

    Google has what experience with global retail exactly? You still can’t get Google Wallet in most countries. Maybe you’ll be able to buy a Nest in any colour you like?

  7. Mr. Grey (@mister_grey) - 10 years ago

    As someone who’s been looking into security/surveillance gear for my new home and specifically looking for iOS enabled stuff I can tell you that ALL of these products involve you buying into “some server” that is “somewhere in the USA” that holds all your data. This is true of ALL the new magic door locks, ALL the new surveillance video cameras and baby monitors, etc. etc. This is true of ALL of these types of products even when it isn’t necessary to use a server at all.

    So to buy into any of them you have to trust that this random company from (to me) another country will keep all your data safe. The video surveillance guys are keeping video of your living room and bedroom on their serve. The door lock people are keeping data on every person who comes and goes from your house.

    Nest is almost certainly going to be creating competing products for all of these things, and yes, they will be keeping your personal data, and yes, all that data will go into the big Google in the sky.

    I love the *idea* of all of these products and the fact that they can be controlled by an app is fantastic, but absolutely NO ONE involved in making these new thingamajigs gives a rat’s behind about privacy, especially data privacy. Sure they *say* the server is encrypted and safe, but there is simply no way to tell.

    Currently, anyone who has any of these Internet connected products is just a fool IMO. Someday, when they catch on, perhaps someone will make a set of them that don’t require you to blindly trust a bunch of people you’ve never met in a country you’ve never been to with your most personal and sensitive data, but that day isn’t here yet.

  8. Ocsaif Tiartrop - 10 years ago

    Why $3B? … Cocaine isn’t cheap guys.
    Compare an older video of Fadell and this one.

    First 15 secs says it all.

    I don’t know if the world is ready for Google crack pipes.

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