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Back when the Nexus 6 was launched, AOSP commits about the device revealed that it was supposed to ship with a fingerprint sensor, but it was removed at the last minute. The reason? Apple.
In an interview with The Telegraph, Dennis Woodside, who used to work at Google before heading Motorola and eventually joining Dropbox, revealed that the dimple on the back of the Nexus 6 was supposed to incorporate a fingerprint sensor.
However, since Apple bought the best fingerprint sensor supplier on the market and the second best supplier was not there yet, the company decided at the last moment to ditch the sensor and release the handset without it. Woodside, however, states that the addition of a fingerprint sensor “wouldn’t have made that big a difference.”
Motorola was among the first companies to release a phone (Atrix) with a fingerprint scanner in 2011, where it worked closely with AuthenTec, the company which was acquired by Apple for $356 million in 2012. The technology from the same company is now used by Apple on the Touch ID sensor integrated into the home button of its iOS devices.
In the end, it is pretty remarkable that Motorola and Google decided not to go with a fingerprint sensor on the Nexus 6 because it was not up to the mark. Now only if Samsung realized the same thing as well.
[Via The Telegraph]
