Acers CloudMobile A800 handset was set to launch yesterday. However, the launch was cancelled abruptly, with journalists turned away at the door by event officials.

What happened? Well, the handset was set to run Chinese commerce firm Alibabas Aliyun OS – unlike previous Acer handsets, such as the CloudMobile S500, which ran on Android. And according to Alibabas CloudMobile unit, which worked with Acer on the device, Google may have had a hand in cancelling the launch.

Alibaba CloudMobile released this statement: “Our partner received notification from Google that if the new product launch with Aliyun went ahead, Google would terminate Android product cooperation and related technical authorisation with Acer.”

A Tokyo-based Google spokesman and Acers Shanghai-based spokeswoman Elaine Cao declined to comment.

We reported back in April that Android was the top smartphone platform in China in 2011 with 68.4 per cent market share. The study said that China – the worlds largest market for mobile phones, with 998m subscribers – is still a key smartphone growth market.

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