The upcoming biography of the late Steve Jobs revealed the extent to which he disliked Google’s Android, vowing to "destroy" the mobile operating system.
The biography by Walter Isaacson reveals how Jobs was infuriated with what he perceived to be ideas that Android had stolen from iOS, Apple’s operating system for its iPhone and iPad devices.
According to Isaacson Jobs was particularly angry when HTC released an Android phone that had many features similar to those of the iPhone.
"I will spend my last dying breath if I need to, and I will spend every penny of Apple’s $40 billion in the bank, to right this wrong," Jobs is reported to have said. "I’m going to destroy Android, because it’s a stolen product. I’m willing to go thermonuclear war on this."
The biography, which the Associated Press claims to have a copy of ahead of its official publication next week, also goes into details of attempts between the two companies to strike a deal over the dispute.
A meeting between Jobs and Google’s then CEO Eric Schmidt at a Palo Alto café failed to resolve the issues. According to Isaacson Jobs said to Schmidt: "I don’t want your money. If you offer me $5 billion, I won’t want it. I’ve got plenty of money. I want you to stop using our ideas in Android, that’s all I want."
It shows how far the relationship between the two had fallen. Schmidt sat on Apple’s board between 2006 and 2009 before quitting as the rivalry between the two giants intensified.
Apple is currently involved in a number of patent disputes with a wide variety of competitors in the increasingly bitter battle for smartphone domination, including Samsung over the Galaxy range of phones and tablets.
Google itself is fighting plenty of patent battles over its Android operating system. It purchased Motorola earlier this year, which it said would strengthen its "patent portfolio, which will enable us to better protect Android from anti-competitive threats from Microsoft, Apple and other companies."
The company had previously criticised a, "hostile, organised campaign against Android by Microsoft, Oracle, Apple and other companies, waged through bogus patents."
Apple founder and former CEO Steve Jobs died earlier this month following a long battle with cancer.
