Google's Buying Out Motorola For 12.5 Billion USD

[madjr]

also needs mention, that some time ago i read that motorola was also planning to sell windows phone 7 phones.

guess they wont now

[Adarion]

also needs mention, that some time ago i read that motorola was also planning to sell windows phone 7 phones.
guess they wont now

*announcer's voice*
People are asked to stay in their homes. The following week is expected to be filled with high velocity chairs flying around from an unknown origin in the state of Washington. The epicenter seems to be in Redmond.

[liam]

Yes, only separate business unit give some protection in case of patent war. Google will still be able to say that Android is free, so charging it for Motorolla gains is not right.

But I wish they would buy HTC (maybe then they would free S3TC patent?)

Anyway, there should be more news about it as it may have huge impact on market.

Motorola undoubtably has a larger, more pertinent patent portfolio and their market cap is about 1/2 that of HTC.
As was mentoined elsewhere, if this was about patents, it would've been cheaper for Google to license them than to buy them.
This would seem to be about controlling the stack for at least one phone, IMHO.
Perhaps that means they will make the software process more open since they can release their own GPhone (ugh, bad name...)?

[smitty3268]

As was mentoined elsewhere, if this was about patents, it would've been cheaper for Google to license them than to buy them.
This would seem to be about controlling the stack for at least one phone, IMHO.

That only works if the patent owners are actually willing to license them. Apple is not, they intend on using their patents to ban their competition rather than licensing and making money that way. This gives Google the firepower to launch a countersuit, which can be used to leverage a cross-licensing agreement that the other side wouldn't agree to otherwise.

And the initial Google blog post about it mentioned patents quite prominently. It was definitely a large part of the reason they made this purchase. I'd guess controlling the whole stack is seen on an equal footing in terms of importance, or even a nice bonus, rather than the primary reason for purchasing Motorolla.

[deanjo]

Should be interesting scrap if the sale gets approved by the various sanctions.

[PreferLinux]

I believe Motorola has patents that are just about necessary to build any cell phone at all, as does Nokia. That is probably what Google wants ? and what a cross-licensing agreement wouldn't give them ? to help against any patent lawsuits.

[deanjo]

I believe Motorola has patents that are just about necessary to build any cell phone at all, as does Nokia. That is probably what Google wants ? and what a cross-licensing agreement wouldn't give them ? to help against any patent lawsuits.

I also believe many of those are also (cross) licensed already. What I have yet to see is (even just a number) how many of those patents are not already license.

[3rdalbum]

Motorola Defy

I hope this doesn't mean Motorola's version of Android becomes the "stock" version of Android. The Motorola Defy is probably the worst Android phone out there due to crashes, high battery use, and a lack of features in its software that people actually want and need...

[elanthis]

*announcer's voice*
People are asked to stay in their homes. The following week is expected to be filled with high velocity chairs flying around from an unknown origin in the state of Washington. The epicenter seems to be in Redmond.

Hey, now. I live in Redmond, and for two years lived across the street from Microsoft's main campus (literally, directly across the street), and I've yet to see a chair fly by even once.

There has been a time or two, however, that I've heard a Kirk-like bellow of "SCHMIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIDT!"

... also, I swear to God if I never see another "i bing, u bing?" bumper sticker again, I will be able to die a happy man. Most like though if i don't see them anymore it just means I've died and no longer can see anything at all. sigh.

[hal2k1]

Samsung is too big to buy, and HTC doesn't have any patents, which I'm sure made Motorola the perfect target.

Hopefully Samsung and HTC don't get too worried about this - i can see how they might be nervous that Android might start favoring Motorola phones now.

Google has a history with buying companies with patent holdings ... Google bought On2, and then they gave everyone worldwide a perpetual, royalty-free, irrevocable and zero cost license to use those patents.

Then they formed a community patent pool, similar to the OIN community patent pool for Linux patents, which Google is also a licensee.

http://www.webm-ccl.org/

I think Google may start another community patent pool for the mobile patents from MMI, whereupon Samsung and HTC would join immediately.

In fact, Google don't even need to set up an orgainisation to do this, they already have one in place:

http://www.openhandsetalliance.com/index.html

HTC, Samsung, Motorola, Sony Ericsson and LG are already members:

http://www.openhandsetalliance.com/oha_members.html