[quote=flu][quote=AN]GOOG bought MOT for their patents. Those of us who are in the industry assume that GOOG had no intention of holding onto MOT hardware division for very long. Which is why they sold off the connected home division of MOT pretty quickly.[/quote]
I figured that once the Nexus line refreshes recently still consisted of the Samsung, Acer, LG instead of any Motorola product…
It’s actually sad. It must have been frustrating to have been at Motorola’s handset/tablet division and been treated like a stepchild… I actually liked Mot products and was hoping they were actually do something with it.. But I guess that would have terrified all the other OEM’s and cause them to cut producing android products…[/quote]
As some of you know – I lived through some of this split/acquisition/split/sell. I was part of mot mobility when it was acquired by google. I don’t work in the handset group though (cable tv). It was clear google had NO interest in my (profitiable) division and sold us off last year. It was also clear that google didn’t know what to do with the handset group. There were some really talented engineers – but in San Diego, that group closed down last fall. So what’s being sold has no effect on San Diego… those guys have already landed new jobs and are probably happy not to be there anymore.
Zachs did an analysis of what Google paid for the patents, Once the dust settled. The purchase price of Mot Mob, less the cash on the books, less the price they got from ARRIS for the home division, less the price their getting from Lenovo, PLUS the losses MotMob has wracked up in the meantime ($2B!!!)
It was under $4B for the patents. Google originally offered $9B for the patents. The 2 parts of the company they sold off have rights to use the patents, but no income from them. Google got what they wanted in the long run.
It’s been a crazy ride over the last few years. As an employee who lived through it I have a less positive view of Google as an employer. Not sure they violated the “do no evil” motto – but they didn’t act with much humanity.
