Google is buying Motorola Mobility
In what can be described as a surprising move, Google and Motorola Mobility has agreed that the former will buy the latter company for a total of $12.5 billion. The reason why I’m slapping that “Mobility” it to the end of the name is that Motorola Mobility spun off from Motorola earlier this year and became a separate company to what’s now known as Motorola Solutions, the latter of which does corporate level electronic solutions. That means that it’s essentially the mobile electronics division that Google has agreed to buy, not the entire Motorola concept, but the mobile part of the company is after all the company that we all think of when we say Motorola these days.
The reason for the acquisition is likely to be related to Motorola’s patents rather than their products, as the ridiculous patent war that is going on with companies suing and countersuing all over the place is going to be a lot easier for Google if they have some patents of their own. A spokesman for Google reassures us in the press release that Android will not affected negatively by this acquisition and will continue to be an open platform that Motorola will use as any other company. It’s rather ironic that Google buys the company that from a tablet point of view is viewed by many as the big loser at the moment, and hopefully this deal will make it easier for Motorola to get rid of the bad reputation and release a better tablet in the future. Then again, it’s unlikely that this will mean that much to us as consumers, especially since Motorola has already been the first to get new Android versions on several occasions.
[Google via Engadget]
