Lenovo to buy Google's Motorola handset division

Post by notatoad » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 6:10 AM UTC

jerf wrote: post #197

mediaman wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know Google is trying to break out of their traditional business, but it seems like they've been trying to do that for years and nearly all their revenue is still ads. Just because very smart entrepreneurs are able to capitalize on an opportunity (search) and turn it into one of the world's largest companies, doesn't mean they can arbitrarily do it again.

Has any company the size of Google ever successfully pulled of this sort of diversification? (Honest question, there may well be answers I'm not thinking of. But I do mean very large companies, I know smaller ones diversify all the time successfully (and unsuccessfully).) For context, you think about a company like Microsoft or Google "diversifying", and, you know, for them it's not enough to "merely" build a $250 mi…

Post by Aloha » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 6:21 AM UTC

CompleteMoron wrote: post #124

objclxt wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...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.

Post by smaddali » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 6:32 AM UTC

yabatopia wrote: post #164

zmmmmm wrote: post #128

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 -…

I don't think Nest has much to do with it. As I see it: 1) Google and Samsung sign a sweet patent deal, 2)Samsung halts or slows down the development of replacements for Google apps and promises not to fork Android, 3)In return Google drops Motorola, a direct competitor to Samsung.

Post by hablahaha » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 6:37 AM UTC

Pxtl wrote: post #192

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.

I bought my wife a Moto G. I've been pretty impressed with the device - I was hopeful for the future of Moto/Google. This is disappointing. Lenovo is an intensely boring company, they're not going to do anything fun with the Moto brand.

Post by igravious » Thu, Jan 30, 2014, 6:48 AM UTC

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…