T-Mobile Announces Bigger Investment In Google Services, Pixel Phones

Although all US carriers now offer Android phones on their shelves, T-Mobile has a distinct place in Android history. It is the carrier to actually put its faith in the still-nascent smartphone platform with the T-Mobile G1, a.k.a the HTC Dream. Now it is renewing that close ties not just with Android but with Google's entire ecosystem by betting on some of the tech giant's services, even at the expense of one of its own.

Like many of its rivals, T-Mobile has launched some of its own services, particularly when it comes to video-on-demand and video streaming. In fact, its Live, Live+, and Live Zone were announced just last October. It is perhaps a show of its commitment to its stronger relationship with Google that it is winding those down in favor of a single YouTube TV experience.

The announcement of a stronger partnership between the carrier and Google also means more apps and services being pre-installed and offered on Android phones. That includes, for example, a Google One cloud storage subscription that also serves as a secure backup for the devices.

T-Mobile is also making the rather bold move to make Android Messages the default messaging app on all its Android devices. That does, however, also come with support for Rich Communication Services or RCS, the SMS successor that Google has been trying to push in the industry. That, of course, requires carrier support and this move is pretty much a big show of that support for the technology.

While it does have a lot of Android phones under its network, the partnership will also see T-Mobile pushing Pixel devices more strongly. That will cover both sales and supports of Google's self-designed phones which the latter probably hopes will help raise the Pixel's profile and sales in the country. This not only suggests that T-Mobile will be carrying more than just the Pixel 4a (5G) but that even more Pixel devices will be coming soon as well.