It should not be news to anyone that Google is working on a 2010 release timeframe for its newly dubbed Google Chrome OS. What has been interesting is the chatter which has occured since then, many fingers pointing at Apple as the real beneficiary of this move. However, nothing could be further from the truth. What Google did was brilliant, very similar to its strategy with Chrome and I will outline it below.

The key to the Chrome strategy is that Google does not expect to get a large chunk of market share, what they want is to put pressure on Microsoft and Apple to add features similar to what Chrome OS has, which by nature will be very Web-centric. This minimalist desktop approach that is tightly bound to cloud services is the core of Chrome OS, Microsoft and Apple will be forced to make adjustments that will be in Googles favor, just to compete. Google is really in a win-win situation, as it was with their Chrome browser, that has a minimal amount of market share but was the initiator of more browser wars focused on Javascript speed and more stable browsing; both of which are central to Google’s cloud services taking off.

Google is not the only one who benefits, any company largely hedging their bets on the Cloud and/or web based applications has something to gain, even Microsoft does, however, Google does not have a dominant office suite or OS, they need this more than Microsoft or other big players do. Their mental-market-dominance is the real force behind the change that will happen, not the quality of the OS they will release.

It becomes obvious that this strategy is mid-term in focus, Google is playing a game of Chess with Microsoft, with benefits being reaped slowly over time as their competition adjusts. What is the next move and is it necessarily by Google or one of its competitors?