Samsung launches its own "WWDC" as an alternative to Google IO

Samsung will host its own developer conference this October in San Francisco, promoting its own Software Development Kits and tools rather than simply remaining a passive licensee of Google's Android and Chrome OS.

A report by Ars cited a Samsung representative as saying that the Samsung Developer Conference would be a “cross-product, cross-platform” event.

While most of Samsung's smartphones use Android, usually paired with the company's own proprietary TouchWiz user interface layer, the company also licenses Windows Phone from Microsoft, and builds PCs and netbooks running both Microsoft's Windows and Google's web-based Chrome OS.

The company also began experimented with its own Linux-based Bada platform for smartphones in 2009, efforts it has since folded into a partnership with Intel named Tizen, which can act as an alternative to Android to host Samsung's own TouchWiz.

Tizen is a replacement of the MeeGo program Intel initiated with Nokia in early 2010, which was a merging of two efforts to produce an open source mobile platform the two firms had earlier maintained in parallel: Intel's Moblin and Nokia's Maemo.

The company also develops its own SmartTV products, although as reader Paul Herring commented, "hopefully they'll also be looking at the Smart TV UI. I can't believe a company makes such a ridiculously unfriendly system in 2013!"

Last month, Samsung acquired Boxee for $30 million in an effort to improve its SmartTV offerings.

Boxee is yet another open source project that exists separate from Android and Tizen as operating environments built on top of Linux. It is also embroiled in complaints of violation of the GPLv3.

With its resources spread across Windows, Windows Phone, different versions of Android, Tizen, Boxee and its own proprietary offerings, Samsung has a lot to discuss with developers. The company may seek to harmonize its various platforms. The conference is scheduled for October 27-29.