Facebook Asks Employees To Stop Using iPhones

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Facebook Chief Product Officer Chris Cox asked all company employees to give up their iPhones and start using devices running on Android, according to a report from Wired. Speaking to the reporters at Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, Cox said, “I am mandating a switch of a whole bunch of my team over to Android, just because people, when left up to their own devices, will often prefer an iPhone.”

Facebook Asks Employees To Stop Using iPhones

Why Android and not iOS?

Such a move does not mean that Facebook has a newfound love for Android or that it has issues with Apple, but rather, logical reasoning guides this move. Cox said the majority uses Android devices for accessing Facebook, and this serves as a good enough reason for the company to mandate its employees to use Android devices. Using Android gadgets will help Facebook employees report bugs efficiently and live the same experience that most of Facebook users live in today. Cox further said that employees will use the version of the app that common people use and not the developer’s version.

Facebook aims to expand its user base in emerging economies like India, Mexico and Turkey, among other countries. Apple devices carry premium price tags, because of which the majority of users in developing countries use Android devices, which are available for a lower price compared to iOS devices.

Facebook working to resolve issues with Android app

Complaints about the heavy file size, high RAM usage and the requirement for high-speed Internet are a few issues that users report the most for Facebook’s Android app. In an effort to tackle all these issues, the social network released its Facebook Lite app, which has a size of just 1.38 MB, does not consume much RAM and works fine on 2G devices.

Facebook’s global user base is comprised of 1.5 billion people. This switch could help the company in innumerable ways with its expansion goal. Among all the operating systems, Android has the largest installed user base as of 2015. There are 60 million Android smartphones in India representing a 90% market share, according to IDC. According to a report from TeCake, Android is the leading smartphone OS with an 82.8% share, while iOS holds second position with a 13% share.

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