Reuters: US Department of Justice to Approve Google-Motorola Deal, Could Clear Deal As Early As Next Week
Reuters is reporting from sources close to the matter that Google and Motorola will have their acquisition proposal approved by the United States Department of Justice and that the deal could be cleared as early as next week. It will allow Google to purchase Motorola for $12.5 billion. While Google will own Motorola, Motorola will continue to operate as a separate entity.
Google’s really in it for the patents that Motorola’s been successful with, as of late. Google originally stated that the acquisition would be key in their hopes to help Android OEM partners up against serious injunction lawsuits from competitors Microsoft and Apple.
Google has faced a long road to get to this point. With the opportunity to take control of a patent portfolio as big as Motorola’s, competitors and antitrust regulators carefully scrutinized this deal. Google’s approach to it all has gone a long way to ensuring those folks that they won’t abuse their power once they do gain control of the extremely lucrative portfolio.
The Mountain View company sent letters to the IEEE and other standards committees to reassure them that they won’t use the patents for evil and will only seek injunction if other parties seek injunction against Google and/or its partners. Read more about that here.
If the deal is approved, don’t expect much to change. Motorola will be Motorola and will push out devices like they have been. They’ll have a nice payday to make up for the quarter losses they’ve suffered and they won’t be getting preferential treatment from Google in terms of Android. Still, we’re happy to see that all of this will down. [Reuters]