Google Keeps Patents Sells Motorola To Lenovo For $2.91B

Even though Mobility had a check to Google for $2.92 billion they have decided to sell Motorola to Lenovo for $2.91 billion which includes $660 million in cash, $750 million in stock, and $1.5 billion to be paid out in 3 years. I think what blew it for us is when I insisted that we have some initial meetings on Facetime. Oh well, perhaps next time. Google will also keep the vast majority of Moto’s patents (shocker) and gove 2K to Lenovo including which should be a very attractive license on them for Google. The shocking part of this whole story is that Lenovo CEO Yang Yaunqing does not have "an effective plan yet," but is pretty “confident” that it can fix the profit issues at Motorola. Wow. I would like to have sat in that board room and heard that pitch to the members. Generally an effective plan is something that comes up in those meetings.

In any case Lenovo is now drinking the Android Kool-Aid and will begin cranking out Moto products and thinks they will sell 100 million smart phones in one year. As Mobility Digest’s Stephen Mesik points out:

“But I think the real implication here that no one seems to have noticed is that this makes Apple (and soon-to-be Microsoft) the only American phone maker(s) left.”

Google originally purchased Motorola in 2012 for $12.5 billion but has since spun off Motorola’s set-top box unit for $2 billion. Of course the Patents are always the driver in technology acquisitions it seems and Google gets to keep the good ones.