Google said today it views its relationship with Apple as valuable and does not see any reason for that to change, even with the rumors Microsoft’s Bing may replace Google search on the iPhone.

"Apple is a very close and valuable partner and we’re very excited about the relationship we have with them today. We have no reason to believe that’s going to change," said Vic Gundortra, Vice President, Engineering, Google, at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

"We don’t want to comment on those rumors," he told Reuters when pressed on the issue of the iPhone at a roundtable. "We think that relationship is stable."

When asked about the Nexus Two, a second Google-branded phone targeted at business users the company is expected to introduce, Gundotra said no decisions had been finalized about how many Google phones there would be or who would make them.

Google and HTC released the co-branded Nexus One last month, the first time Google has used its name for a consumer hardware product.

"We just haven’t made those decisions yet," Gundotra said when asked if HTC would also make the Nexus Two. "We decided to take the flagship phones, the best phones that were available, and those would have Google branding."