Google hires Amazon exec to develop its new phones

Google has hired one of the key personnel in Amazon's hardware division, according to The Information. The Big G has apparently signed up David Foster (no, not the composer) to head up the development of its Pixel phones and fill a new position in the company. He's now Google's vice president of product engineering, underlining Mountain View's bigger focus on hardware going forward. Foster was with Amazon for five years, leading hardware development of the Echo speakers, the Kindle Paperwhite and Voyage, among other devices at Lab126.

That laboratory, as you might know, is Amazon's formerly secret hardware facility, which was originally formed to create the Kindle e-readers. It eventually spawned not just the Echo speakers, but also the company's other devices, such as the Dash buttons, Fire tablets, TV and even the late Fire phone. The last one turned out to be a huge flop -- Amazon kept slashing its prices for a year in an effort to move stocks before killing the product altogether. Due to its failure, the company decided to shelve its sequel and several other projects in the pipeline.

Before Amazon, Foster worked on hardware for Microsoft, helping create the Zune HD. He was also with Apple for five years, developing hardware components for its devices. It's not clear what role he played in creating the Pixel phones Google is expected to reveal tomorrow. But the company's future devices will have his fingerprints all over them.