Tuesday 10 September 2013
Android KitKat: the story behind a delicious partnership
On last Tuesday Google announced that the next version of Android will be named "KitKat,"
after the ubiquitous chocolate bars sold around the world. It's the
first time a mainstream operating system has been given a licensed name,
and the deal with trademark owner Nestle took time to complete: the BBC reports
that Google director of Android global partnerships John Lagerling
first called Nestle about the name in late November of 2012, and that
the deal was only finalized at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in
February of this year. "We decided within the hour to say let's do it,"
said Nestle executive vice president of marketing Patrice Bula.
There's no exchange of money involved, but there is a significant
promotional element: 50 million KitKat bars in 19 countries will have
prominent Android branding and offer buyers the chance to win a Nexus 7 tablet and Google Play gift cards. All those wrappers started production
two months ago in secret so they would be ready for the promotion; not
even Google employees knew about the new name. "We kept calling the name
Key Lime Pie internally and even when we referred to it with partners,"
Lagerling told the BBC. Adding to the air of intrigue, Nestle is
commemorating the partnership with 500 specially-produced KitKats in the
shape of the Android logo that the company claims took "weeks" to
create in "a secret location in Europe."
"We decided within the hour to say let's do it."
But secret meetings in
Barcelona and commemorative chocolates aside, the deal did have some
wrinkles. Nestle owns and control the KitKat brand throughout the world,
but Hershey's licenses the brand and manufactures the candy in the
United States — obviously a key market for Google and Android. As the
deal began to take shape with Nestle, Google also had to reach out to
Hershey's and work out an arrangement. And while sources say the final
deal is entirely between Google and Nestle, Hershey's KitKats and new
KitKat minis in the United States will indeed carry the Android logo and
giveaway information. So why the name change? A Google spokesperson tells The Verge
that KitKats have long been Android engineering head Hiroshi Lockheimer's favorite candy bar — his Gmail avatar was a KitKat icon
several years ago. At one point in 2010, the Android team even decorated
Lockheimer's entire office door with KitKats, pictured here. Given the
wide variety of new wrappers and branding that will appear on KitKats
throughout the world, it appears that another opportunity will soon be
well at hand.
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