![](https://fooyoh.com/files/attach/images/1097/234/961/009/stevejobsiphone1.jpg)
Apple changed the landscape of smartphones forever when it launched the first iPhone in January 2007. There were some who could adapt to the new normal, but the ones who were slow suffered the most.
Google was the first to recognize how important the iPhone was, according to a new book. Google engineer Chris DeSalvo says as soon as Steve Jobs revealed the iPhone to the world, he knew the Android team would have to "start over", according to
Dogfight: How Apple and Google Went to War and Started a Revolution by Fred Vogelstein, which was
excerpted in The Atlantic.
“What we had suddenly looked just so... '90s,” DeSalvo said. “It’s just one of those things that are obvious when you see it.”
Before the iPhone unveiling, DeSalvo, Andy Rubin and the rest of the Android team had been working on platforms and prototypes. All those plans had to be scrapped in the wake of the iPhone. The phone was "ugly" and it looked more like a BlackBerry than the sleek iPhone.
The Android team eventually switched their focus on a phone with a touchscreen, only launching in 2008, months after the second generation iPhone would go on sale.