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The Mountain View, Calif.-based company said the new software also includes new features such as hardware acceleration of video and smooth navigation of Flash-enabled Web sites.

With a few exceptions, smartphones today, including the iPhone, haven't been able to show much Flash content, even though, the standard helps deliver around 75 percent of online videos worldwide.

"If you believe in openness, if you believe in choice, if you believe in innovation from everyone, then welcome to Android," said Vic Gundotra, Google's vice president of engineering.

Last month, Apple chief executive Steve Jobs slammed Adobe, publishing a lengthy essay that sharply criticizes the popular Flash software, calling it unreliable and ill-suited for the iPhone.

"It turns out that on the Internet, people use Flash," Gundotra said. "And part of being open means you are inclusive, rather than exclusive, and you are open to innovation."

Adobe said it has fixed many of the issues in 10.1, such as being a battery hog. It does this by rendering only the part of page that shows the video, and not the whole screen, as it had previously done. It also shuts down when the device goes into sleep mode, so it isn't consuming power in the background.

Other features include the ability to tether a laptop to the phone, a faster, more powerful browser, a manager to store applications on a microSD card, improved security and refinements to Gmail, calendar and voice recognition software.

Google said Nexus One owners will be able to upgrade to Android 2.2 over-the-air later today. The HTC Incredible, Evo 4G, Desire and Motorola Droid will receive it in the coming weeks.