Vega represents a major change in Amazon’s consumer hardware plans, following the significant setback of its Fire Phone. Currently, Amazon uses the free Android Open Source Project model as the basis for its Fire OS. However, Amazon does not include core Google/Android services like the Play Store and Gmail in its Fire series of devices to avoid licensing fees.

If Vega completely removes Android from the equation, Amazon will have greater control over the software and apps it wants to include in its future devices. However, persuading developers to support its vision will be a challenge for Amazon.

The recent failures of Windows Phone and the declining Tizen OS at Samsung serve as examples. Amazon has reportedly encouraged developers to use React Native as an application framework to build apps for Vega and Android-based Fire hardware more easily.

For customers, especially those with Android-derived Fire hardware, Amazon’s Vega approach may not be well-received. Amazon could choose to support them for a few more years before fully transitioning to Vega-based devices. Alternatively, it could quietly migrate a selected group of them to Vega, similar to Google’s Fuchsia push, although this would not be a simple task.