In what could be the acquisition of the year, Google is on its way to acquire Motorola Mobility for US 12.5 Billion! With so many patent infringements leveled against it, Google has decided to defend itself aggressively. Attack is the best form of defense they say, and since Motorola holds significant amount of patents in the mobile sector, Google has made this strategic decision to counter the likes of Microsoft and Apple in the patents turf war. Its summarized best in it’s own words:
“We recently explained how companies including Microsoft and Apple are banding together in anti-competitive patent attacks on Android. The U.S. Department of Justice had to intervene in the results of one recent patent auction to “protect competition and innovation in the open source software community” and it is currently looking into the results of the Nortel auction. Our acquisition of Motorola will increase competition by strengthening Google’s patent portfolio, which will enable us to better protect Android from anti-competitive threats from Microsoft, Apple and other companies.”
It should be recalled that Apple, that had recently joined a consortium called Rockstar Bidco along with Mobile companies Research in Motion (RIM), Microsoft, Ericsson, Sony, EMC , Intel and were engulfed in a bitter war over the acquisitions of Nortel’s patents. Nortel owned about approximately 600o patents that included wireless, wireless 4G, data networking, optical, voice, Internet, service provider, semiconductors and other patents. The bid was eventually won by the Rockstar Bidco for about $ 4.5 Billion which, Tech analysts believed would cause serious damage to Google’s Android platform.
Official press release by Google is HERE
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