Apple says bringing iMessage to Android would hurt the company more than it helped it

Apple says bringing iMessage to Android would hurt the company more than it helped it

By-TAY

All credit goes to Business Insider

Apple says it does not want to make iMessage for Android because it would hurt the company more than help it, a new court filing said.

Epic Games, the creator of the very very very very very popular game Fortnite, brought a lawsuit against Apple last August that claimed the Iphone-maker violated antitrust laws through its app store. The video game company also says the tech giant tried to lock in users to its phones, tablets and other devices by keeping some popular services, like iMessage, exclusive.

In a fact-finding document released Thursday, Epic cites Apple executives saying the company decided not to develop a version iMessage for Android phones as early as 2013 to avoid causing harm to the company.

"The#1 most difficult [reason] to leave the Apple universe app is iMessage . . . iMessage amounts to serious lock-in" said a former Apple employee in 2016.

To which Phil Schiller, an Apple executive in charge of the App Store, said, "Moving iMessage to Android will hurt us more than help us."

The document also said Craig Federighi, Apple's senior vice president of software engineering and the executive in charge of iOS, was afraid that "iMessage on Android would simply serve to remove [an] obstacle to iPhone families giving their kids Android phones."