Google's Android platform may be the hottest player on the cell phone market, having recently passed Apple in the U.S. market, but it's by no means the perfect platform.  Recently there have been concerns about the battery life of Android smartphones, which reportedly isn't measuring up to the rival iPhone's.

The top executives at Google tackled that issue at Google Zeitgeist, Google's outreach summit for developers.  Google's co-founder Larry Page blamed app developers, stating, "I have noticed there are a few people who have phones where there is software running in the background that just sort of exhausts the battery quickly. If you are not getting a day, there is something wrong."

Google CEO Eric Schmidt chimed in, clarifying the issue on battery drain.  He stated, "The primary consumer of the battery life on these phones is the transmit/receive circuit. So tuning that and obviously figuring out a way to not use too much of that extends your battery life.  And people bring in applications that are not particularly smart about that, which is what Larry is trying to get at."

Mr. Page quipped back, "We can give you a bigger battery probably. I'll see you afterwards."

The concerning thing is that according to some reports, Android's battery life is draining rather quickly even when in standby or idle -- with no apps running (aside from the core phone apps) and no data being transmitted.  Fortunately for Google, these reports seem to be putting little damper on Android phone sales.  

Android 2.2 is about to make its debut, bringing with it Flash (hopefully that doesn't cause further battery issues).  And the hot HTC EVO 4G, the world's first 4G smartphone, will make its debut on the Sprint network early next month.