Microsoft has a web browser – Google comes out with a browser.

Google has a great search service – Microsoft comes out with a great (bing) search service.

Microsoft has an operating system – Google plans an operating system.

Google’s recent announcement to have a Chrome operating system available in about a year has generated a lot of chatter lately – but is it really a Windows-killer?  I think not – not anytime soon, that is.  Although the era of Vista will soon be behind Microsoft and Windows 7 (still in beta) is earning favorable early reviews, the primary reason Google’s OS won’t vanquish Microsoft’s Windows operating systems is that while the two companies’ browsers and search engines fulfill exactly the same roles, a direct Windows-Chrome OS comparison is a lot less apt.

It’s apples vs. oranges: the local power of the Windows desktop vs. the economy and convenience of the Chrome web browser (which will serve as the Chrome operating system’s sole user interface).

In our initial report on the Chrome browser, we noted that it was likely Google was planning to ‘bake in’ additional functionality to make Chrome a fatter and more optimized client for Google Apps than a traditional 3rd party web browser.  Although more recently we’d been left wondering about what was behind Google’s mysteriously laid-back promotion of the Chrome browser, the decision to take a new approach and instead develop a full Chrome operating system could be the answer.

Google is all about improving the performance of web applications, via either extending the web protocol stack or via initiatives such as “Native Code”, which allows a compliant browser to actually execute compiled x86 code on a protected (‘sandbox’) portion of the processor itself.  The push to give web applications more some of the advantages of desktop applications dates back to 2007, when they released “Google Gears”, a cross-browser plug-in allowing compliant web apps (such as the Google Apps suite) access to persistent (offline) local data storage.  Unfortunately, Google Gears hasn’t yet enjoyed the level of user take-up the company hoped it would.  To my mind, though, “Native Code” and the Chrome operating system represent a logical progression evolution in the effort to optimize web app performance, as the browser literally becomes the operating system.

In Conclusion Google has been very successful with search results-based advertising.  With some exceptions (such as gmail), to date they’ve been less successful moving applications off the desktop up to the cloud.  Clearly, they’re now “throwing  the long ball” with the Chrome operating system – and to the extent they’re successful with a new generation of Chrome-powered netbooks and mobile internet devices (note to Google: start talking to Acer, Sony and Dell now), they will indeed impact consumer Windows sales.

However, there will always be use cases that require specialized desktop applications, particularly within the enterprise – and (wisely) Google has no plans to challenge Windows (or OSX) as a heavyweight operating system for hosting local apps – the inertia (for both software vendors and users) and is simply too daunting.