Mozilla Stop Its Failed Firefox OS

After failing to attract consumers and developers' attention, Mozilla decided to ditch Firefox OS, the mobile operating system that initially was targeted for low-cost smartphone.

According to Tech Crunch, Mozilla announced an end to its smartphone experiment, and to stop developing and selling Firefox OS smartphones. However, Mozilla will continue to experiment to connect Firefox OS in the Internet of Things network. The announcement was made in Mozilla developers event in Orlando.

In an official statement as quoted by Tech Crunch, Mozilla SPV of Connected Devices Ari Jaaksi said the Firefox OS is not able to offer the best user experience and Mozilla will stop offering Firefox OS smartphones through carrier channels. However the Mozilla OS will continue to be build as a genuine open source project. Jaaksi also said, "We'll share more on our work and new experiments across connected devices soon."

Firefox OS was developed to provide an operating system for a low-cost smartphone. According to Engadget, although it managed to get some traction in a few areas, particularly Africa and South America, but Firefox OS was never especially popular. Since Android or Windows Phone is now available for less than $100, that makes the price advantage of Firefox OS disappear.

Engadget also acknowledged Mozilla as doing the smart move in cutting off its Firefox OS. It is necessary to help Mozilla concentrate on its browsers, ad blockers and other things central to its mission. As for now, Mozilla is also looking for other party to take over its Thunderbird email application and scaling back its less than essential project.

Mozilla introduced its Firefox OS in July 2011 at the Mozilla developer mailing list with a nickname B2G project. The project then renamed as Mozilla OS and made its global debut in 2013. Many phone manufacturers are interested to make Firefox OS device, namely LG, Huawei, ZTE, and TCL.

Venture Beat tried to contact Mozilla for further details regarding the future of Firefox OS outside of smartphone, but the company is not yet ready to answer. Venture Beat suspected the Firefox OS project will contine to live, but it is not clear about how frequent the update to be.

Firefox OS is developed based on combination of Linux kernel and Firefox browser's rendering engine. Its goal is to create a full open source operating system for smartphone, tablet PC and HD TV that are able to run web application directly. In March, during a Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, Mozilla displayed array of devices powered by Firefox OS that available in 29 countries.

However, unsuccessful market penetration makes Firefox OS has be realistic. It must go back to its core in developing browser and related tools, and focus to take back its position as the most popular browser. The seat that is now taken by Google Chrome.