This could be a huge win for Motorola. Say they control/patent the shell and the communications interface. It's easy and cheap to build. They charge $99 for it

This could be a huge win for Motorola. Say they control/patent the shell and the communications interface. It's easy and cheap to build. They charge $99 for it with great margins. All this while module builders compete both for price and features. Since this is open, the winner in this market will be the company who can build the best ecosystem. Who can do that better than Google? And it would be almost impossible for Samsung to compete, since they are a highly integrated company. The interesting reaction would be from apple: they are highly integrated so hard to move to this model but they also know how to build ecosystems. If Google builds something compelling, I'm grabbing my popcorn.