Although Apple received much of the attention on June 2 for software-focused announcements at its Worldwide Developers Conference, Samsung made a bit of a splash with the Samsung Z smartphone. But this handset is different in one important respect. The Samsung Z is the company’s first smartphone model running the Tizen operating system that was developed in-house. Judging from the effort Samsung put into this announcement, the Samsung Z won’t be the last Tizen-based handset the company launches. Tizen, a Linux-based operating system, has taken a circuitous path to the smartphone market. The operating system is being developed as a project within the Linux Foundation by Samsung, Intel and others in the mobile industry. It’s being offered to the market in the same way that Google introduced Android. Tizen was built into Samsung’s Galaxy Gear 2 and is now being baked into last year’s Galaxy Gear smartwatch model. Tizen has been in development for years and originates from the old Samsung Linux Platform. But the question is what can the Tizen-based Samsung Z offer customers that an Android-based alternative might not? This slide show looks at what the Samsung Z offers prospective buyers. – See more at: http://www.eweek.com/mobile/slideshows/samsungs-tizen-based-z-handset-poses-future-challenge-to-android.html#sthash.5EMz5tL5.dpuf