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Lenovo to buy Google's Motorola handset division

reuters.com

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Re: Lenovo to buy Google's Motorola handset division

#121

Post by absherwin »

bradleyjg wrote: post #114
mediaman wrote: post #7

Huge announcement if true, and if this accounts for the entirety of the Motorola purchase that Google made. That means that in less than two years, Google shredded 85% of the $13bn paid for Motorola. At the time, the high price paid was excused for the patents, because the business itself did not generate nearly enough earnings to justify the price. Now, if it is true that the patents are part of the deal (the articl…

Google may not be able to keep all the tax losses. It was originally reported that google would save $700M a year through 2019.* I'm not sure that they those losses are severable from the rest of the company. * E.g. http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/31/us-motorolamobilit...

There are two types of tax losses. There are those related to previous losses that Google captured on acquisition. The $700MM a year estimate relates to the anticipated future losses of Motorola. While Google is losing that benefit, it is by definition less than the amount lost! So it's not actually a benefit.

Re: Lenovo to buy Google's Motorola handset division

#123

Post by billnguyen »

pearjuice wrote: post #88

It's over, Android is finished. With Google parting hands with Motorola and abandoning Nexus all together (Google Play Edition phones will take over), the consumer is entirely dependent of consumer-oriented manufactures like Samsung. A black day for Android, a good day for Samsung its monopoly.

Nexus phones/products have always been made by external partners (HTC, Samsung, LG, etc...), none of which have ever been Motorola. Why does the Moto sale affect the Nexus line?

Re: Lenovo to buy Google's Motorola handset division

#124

Post by CompleteMoron »

objclxt wrote: post #66
CompleteMoron wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would wager that it means a ton of these patents arent useful anymore.. the stuff coming out of google X will pretty much make these old patents kinda uselesss. Even the very nature of the cell phone is rapidly changing and Google Glass is a useless halfstep with contacts coming right around the corner which will be the real hardware killer.

...a lot of Motorola's patents are related to underlying voice and networking technologies. Unless Google X is proposing to come out with a replacement for GSM (...and it's not) that stuff isn't changing.

GSM is over by 2017/2018 for carriers stateside. Where will the patents for these topologies and compression schemes be then? That is proverbially around the corner corporately.

Re: Lenovo to buy Google's Motorola handset division

#125

Post by ajross »

yetfeo wrote: post #100
adventured wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two things. Price, and no lock-in to Apple's ecosystem.

Aren't you instead locked into Google's ecosystem?

To some extent. Google has to whitelist the apps that use the API. Right now that means you have access to Google's media offerings (including Youtube and G+) of course, but also Netflix and Hulu. Not Amazon yet or (obviously) iTunes.

It will play your local music content, but only recently whitelisted a few apps capable of playing your own video files (even then the codecs and containers supported by Chromecast are a short list, so be prepared to do a bunch of transcoding).

It's not open for sure. But it's not bad either; at $35 I'm willing to forgive the lack of hackability (I have a linux box on the same TV for that, this thing is just a convenience).

And the UI is basically perfect: pull the phone out of your pocket, play the video using exactly the same apps you're used to, and just click the chromecast button to send it to the TV. No more hunting for remotes; on my TV it will even turn it on and switch to the right input source automatically.

Re: Lenovo to buy Google's Motorola handset division

#126

Post by jcastro »

palebluedot wrote: post #105

Google just confirmed it, and explained some of their reasoning: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2014/01/lenovo-to-acquire-mot... I'm inexplicably bummed about this. I was excited to see what Google would do long term with Motorola, and I thought the Moto X and Moto G was a great start. I thought eventually, a Google+Motorola powerhouse could provide a nice yin to Apple's yang.

Yeah I really thought that the Moto X and Moto G brought Moto back.

A pretty nice pure Android handset with a $179 full price is insane!

Re: Lenovo to buy Google's Motorola handset division

#127

Post by yetfeo »

pbreit wrote: post #99
yetfeo wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are the advantages of Chromecast over something like Apple TV?

Much cheaper, doesn't need to plug into wall, more and more open viewing options. Question should probably be reversed (says this Apple fanatic).

It still needs power though so it needs to be plugged into something - whether USB or wall socket. What are the open viewing options? It seems to only provide youtube and google movies in countries that don't have netflix. Does it support streaming a local video from a phone or PC?

Re: Lenovo to buy Google's Motorola handset division

#128

Post by zmmmmm »

It's hard not to draw connections between the various events of the last week or so: 1) Google/Samsung patent deal, 2) Google purchases Nest, 3) Google sells Motorola, 4) Samsung suddenly cools on Tizen.

Theory: Google gets offered the opportunity to buy Nest. Either Larry or Sergey gets serious interested. They bought Motorola because they wanted a serious stake in the hardware market. They toss up which is better - Motorola or Nest? They decide Nest is the winner. They realize the valuations are such that they could pretty much just swap Motorola for Nest. But there's a problem: Motorola was also their insurance for making sure they would always have an OEM to make Android handsets. If Samsung ever turned - they would never find themselves unable to secure a Nexus partner. So they go to Samsung, and offer a deal: patents, guarantees of support, probably other stuff: as long as you agree to make Android your flagship each year AND GPE phone version of it. This seems good enough. Motorola not needed any more and they can get a new toy to play with - Nest is the winner.

Re: Lenovo to buy Google's Motorola handset division

#129

Post by kryptiskt »

magicalist wrote: post #63
jonathannorris wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe Motorola also had $3B in cash when acquired.

Yeah, I'm not sure how straightforward it all was, but according to this article: > At $12.5B, Motorola is Google’s largest acquisition to date. Google paid $40 / share in cash, but received ~$11 / share in cash and $8 / share in deferred tax assets. Thus the value ascribed to operations + patents was about $21 / share, or $6.3B, reflecting a multiple of ~0.5x sales and 12x EBITDA. Now adjusting this further for the…

They have also eaten large Motorola losses for quite a few quarters now. So it's not just the purchase price that is on the cost side.

Re: Lenovo to buy Google's Motorola handset division

#130

Post by zavi »

mediaman wrote: post #7

Huge announcement if true, and if this accounts for the entirety of the Motorola purchase that Google made. That means that in less than two years, Google shredded 85% of the $13bn paid for Motorola. At the time, the high price paid was excused for the patents, because the business itself did not generate nearly enough earnings to justify the price. Now, if it is true that the patents are part of the deal (the articl…

Lenovo is getting 2,000 patents, not 10,000.

http://investor.google.com/releases/2014/0129.html

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