Google Assistant could replace Bixby on Samsung smartphones

Low smartphone sales caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has forced Samsung to take extreme measures. The South Korean company is now negotiating with Google a very important deal that will ultimately give the search giant more access to Samsung smartphones.

According to a new report by Bloomberg, Samsung is ready to offer Google more control over search on its Galaxy phones. One of the aspects of the deal concerns the digital assistants of the two companies – Google Assistant and Bixby.

Although the details of the deal are not official yet since negotiations are still underway, the report says Google's digital assistant and Play Store would be promoted on Galaxy devices, which means that Bixby might be replaced with Google Assistant.

Both companies offered comments on the matter but didn't reveal much about the deal. A Google spokesperson said that “Samsung is free to create its own app store and digital assistant” and that “while we regularly talk with partners about ways to improve the user experience, we have no plans to change that.”

On the other hand, Samsung confirmed that it “remains committed to our own ecosystem and services,” but “at the same time, Samsung closely works with Google and other partners to offer the best mobile experiences for users.”

If a deal is to be made, Samsung will be hugely compensated for agreeing to allow Google to promote its digital assistant and Play Store on Galaxy devices. Google is already paying Apple a lot of money to be the default search engine on the Safari web browser installed on iOS devices, so it could do the same with Samsung.

It remains to be seen how much of its ecosystem Samsung is willing to let go for a big chunk of Google's money. Ultimately, having Google Assistant replace Bixby is not a bad idea, but getting paid for that is such a great deal for Samsung.