Motorola Adding Multi-Touch To All Phones, You Can Blame Apple For Lack of Nexus One Multi-Touch Google-Apple Partnership Cause Lack Of Nexus One Multi-Touch, Motorola Presses On

LAPTOP magazine sat down with Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha and got candid
with him about the future of Motorola products, and the popularity of
Google's Nexus One, and the impending Apple Tablet. Jha, who attended
the Nexus One press event at the Googleplex earlier this month, told the
interviewer that despite the Nexus One, he (and consumers, he believes)
are happy with the Motorola Droid.
When Jha was asked about multi-touch, he said that there were a number
of factors regarding multi-touch and not all of them were technical ,
but a majority of Motorola's devices, in the US or not, would include
multi-touch functionality.
You'll remember, of course, that Nexus One devices sold in the United
States only have limited multi-touch functionality (it's not completely
single touch – despite popular perception, for example, the
virtual on-screen keyboard discreetly uses multi-touch technology). TFTS
comrade Chris talks about ways to get multi-touch on your Nexus One here.
As for why Google didn't include the popular feature on the Nexus One
– over the weekend, super podcaster Leo Laporte of twit.tv
mentioned on his program that a source within Google told him that
Google excluded multi-touch on the device out of respect for Apple.
Apple holds the patent for multi-touch in the United States, and it's
reportedly a very weak one, that wouldn't be defendable in a court of
law. Tech blog Gizmodo reported a similar rumor back in early 2009
around the launch of the G1 phone.
This is why the Palm Pre, which has been released in the United States
and features multi-touch, hasn't faced an Apple lawsuit, because
(allegedly) Apple knows they can't defend their weak multi-touch patent.
Google is a strategic partner with the iPhone, with Google being the
default search provider (at least, for a little while longer), and
doesn't want to offend Apple. Of course, all of this is from 'sources
familiar with the situation' and nothing has been confirmed by Google.
Back to Motorola, Jha says that the Android smartphone market is about
innovation, and that despite the Nexus One, and upcoming Android phones
from LG and Dell, Motorola will stay ahead of the curve by innovating
with new Droid phones. He says he also believes that Motorola's Motoblur
UI for Android is better than the default Google one
When asked about tablets, Jha hinted that they were investigating the
possibility of a 7- or 8-inch Android-Motoblur tablet device. Of course,
like the rest of the industry, they're likely waiting to see what Apple
pulls out on Wednesday.