Wozniak: Android Will Eclipse Apple's iPhone

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak had some kind words for the iPhone in a recent interview with a Dutch newspaper, while also suggesting that Google Android smartphones would eventually eclipse it in market share.

"When it comes to quality, iPhone is leading," De Telegraaf quotes Wozniak as saying in its Nov. 18 article. However, he added, "Android phones have more features." (Take into account that all Woz quotations here come courtesy of Google Translate.)

Wozniak claims that Apple developed a smartphone in conjunction with a Japanese company in 2004, but canceled it due to quality concerns. "If Apple comes with a new product, it must have a real breakthrough," he said. "Companies need to wait to capture a market until they have something extremely strong." Chronologically speaking, that canned smartphone would have beat the iPhone to market by three years.

The newspaper then paraphrases Wozniak as saying Android will overcome its early issues with software consistency, eventually achieving a polish comparable to Apple's iOS.

Wozniak later seemed to retract some of his statements, telling tech blog Engadget: "I'm not trying to put Android down, but I'm not suggesting it's better than iOS by any stretch of the imagination. But it can get greater marketshare and still be crappy."