Update: Samsung delayed release of its first Ice Cream Sandwich smartphone in deference to the death of Steve Jobs. Meanwhile, the company has not sought to delay a court hearing regarding a patent infringement case brought against it by Apple.
(Original story 9/7/11) Google’s Eric Schmidt dropped the Ice Cream Sandwich Bomb Wednesday in San Francisco. Supposedly a slip of the tongue, 
Schmidt let the news out that a revolutionary new version of Android will be here either in October or November.
Android Mini Collectible Figure 3″ – Green
Speaking to the Dreamforce conference, Schmidt said,
We have a new operating system, internally known as Ice Cream Sandwich for some reason, which is being released in October/November, which everyone’s really excited about.
What does this mean?
This means that a new flavor of Android will be out in time for the much anticipated Google Nexus Prime, the company’s latest soon-to-be-failed hardware venture.
Fresh off the release of Honeycomb, Google seems poised to accelerate its operating system developments, probably to keep pressuring Apple, who has a release of its own due out in October.
We don’t know too much about the Nexus Prime smartphone except the following:
- Samsung I9250 (November 28 – December 4)
- Android Ice Cream Sandwich
- 4.65-inch Super AMOLED screen with a 1280 x 720 pixel resolution
- 5 MP camera
It’s a tad on the large side, but excitement in the Android community grows as do hopes of [finally] toppling Apple’s iOS.
Android Mini Collectible Series 02 Hexcode 2/16 Ratio Vinyl Toy Robot Figure
SDK and more info
If Schmidt was telling the truth to the peeps at Dreamforce, that inveitably means that an SDK for Ice Cream Sandwich will come out any day now. The availability of the SDK will flood the Internet with new details of the OS.
Marketing ploy
Rampant skepticism over the iPhone 5 cherade in San Francisco makes more analysts than me believe that Schmidt purposely dropped the bomb. To maximize marketing capital, Google won’t have another “slip” or release the SDK until the end of the month at the earliest.
News about Ice Cream Sandwich first broke when Samsung’s product release schedule was supposedly leaked by an exuberant retailer almost one month ago.
UPDATE 9/10/11: New rumors suggest that the successor to Ice Cream Sandwich will gain the revolutionary features originally slated for it. Code-named Jelly Bean, the product will help Google get Ice Cream sandwich out on time.
