Android KitKat 4.4 – The Deal between Google & Nestle

For those who were thinking that the new name for the next version of Google Android, i.e. Android 4.4 KitKat is something that happened all of a sudden, it’s not happened just recently. Google and Nestle had planned this earlier, in March when the Mobile World Congress was in progress, but both the companies kept the things confidential and kept continuing with the Key Lime Pie name to keep the users interested and unaware of the name that was to actually come into the scene.

Doesn’t the video above remind you of the Apple iPhone videos, which talks about innovation, details and stuff? yes Apple, you are the target here!

Google’s Sundar Pichai, the head of operations for Android, decided about this name, after feeling that Key Lime Pieis not known as a delicacy for many, and thus they wanted something which was more common. While talking to BBC News UK, both the companies said that they worked on the co-branding and kept the copyrights aside, and it took no more than an hour for the Nestle team to decide and agree with the mutual deal.

Nestle Marketing Chief Patrice Bula said that although they took this decision, it was always a risk but they wanted to jump into it.

“Maybe I’ll be fired,” he said, “when you try to lead a new way of communicating and profiling a brand you always have a higher risk than doing something much more traditional. You can go round the swimming pool 10 times wondering if the water is cold or hot or you say: ‘Let’s jump.’

And after they took the jump, both the companies met at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona and finalized the details. The deal went private in a way that even most of the Googlers didn’t get to know about it until the new statue of KitKat was installed at the Google Headquarters in Mountain View.

Finally, even the Nestle team wanted to do something “fun and unexpected” and they got this not a “money-changing-hands kind of deal,” which would mutually benefit both the sides and eventually they aren’t paying anything to each other for this. And yes, Google, you would receive quite a lot of criticism for the name change, but Key Lime Pie is not as popular as KitKat, so a good marketing change!

With the IFA 2013 kicking off, Google could come up with a major announcement, and yes they did show a few people using some never-seen-before device in their hands capturing the KitKat statue, and this could be the Nexus 5, although LG confirmed that they aren’t going to come up with any major announcement in the coming days.

* As a part of the deal, KitKat bars that would now come will have special prizes where people can win the Nexus 7tablets, or the different goodies if they luckily find it in the cover of the KitKat chocolate.