Will Chrome finally make Google cool like Apple?

SINGAPORE – It is yet to be seen whether Google's recently released Chrome will finally make Google cool in the eyes of the ordinary consumers, according to a top executive of Sun Microsystems.

The search giant unveiled Chrome last week, its own browser version which competes with Firefox and Microsoft's Internet explorer. Although still in beta, Google has already touted the Chrome's advantages.

Reggie Hutcherson, head of Sun's technology evangelism group, believes Chrome could represent the merging of search and entertainment. Google said Chrome aims to improve the users' experience of audio and video on the Web.

"Google is basically in the business of search and if they can get to a point of indexing video, that represents the next wave of search," said Hutcherson.

However, making search an exciting consumer "interface" remains a challenge for Google. It is in this aspect that Hutcherson has the highest praise for Apple and its Mac, iPod, and recently iPhone that have achieved cult status.

"Browsers don't look much different from maybe ten years ago and there is not a lot of innovation on the browser per se," the Sun executive said in an interview with INQUIRER.net during his visit in Manila last week.

Chrome is seen more of a challenge to Microsoft, as Google attempts to expanding from search and integrating an already diversified lineup of web-based applications into the browser as a platform.

Hutcherson believed the further growth area for the Web is in mobile devices. Google has also come up with its Android operating system for mobile phones that, incidentally, is going up against Windows Mobile.

Though Google is yet to reveal much about Android and now, Chrome, these two products are expected to be figure significantly in its overall strategy.

"Any company that innovates today definitely must innovate on small devices," Hutcherson said.