Android began its life as a Palo Alto-based startup company, founded in 2003. That company was subsequently acquired by Google in 2005. The Android platform includes an operating system based upon Linux, a GUI, a Web browser and end user applications that can be downloaded. Although the initial demonstrations of Android featured a generic QWERTY smartphone and large VGA screen, the operating system was written to run on relatively inexpensive handsets with conventional numeric keypads.