We all know how badly the Android ecosystem has been affected by fragmentation but it seems Google’s executive chairman doesn’t seem to agree with instead he terms Fragmentation as being differentiation. Here at the CES, Erich Schmidt said:

Differentiation is positive, fragmentation is negative“, he said, adding that “differentiation means that you have a choice and the people who are making the phones, they’re going to compete on their view of innovation, and they’re going to try and convince you that theirs is better than somebody else“.
It’s not required that everyone use the same interface. People are free to make the necessary changes. What’s great is if you don’t like it, you can buy the phone from someone else

The fragmentation issue with Android has been long running and the issue always pick up steam when a new update has just been introduced since all Android phones do not experience the latest update at the same time but it seems unnecessary to Eric Schmidt.