Chris Stone
If there is no risk, there is no reward.” ~Christy Raedeke
When Google does something, it means serious business. Google is taking a huge initiative of buying HTC’s mobile division team for around $1.1 billion. “These future fellow Googlers are amazing folks we’ve already been working with closely on the Pixel smartphone line, and we’re excited to see what we can do together as one team,” Rick Osterloh, Google’s hardware boss, wrote in a blog post. “The deal also includes a non-exclusive license for HTC intellectual property.”
Peter Shen – HTC CFO, said that HTC will employ 2,000 more people once the deal is done. This just makes things interesting for Google.
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With Android, already at the right place, Google now have the power of hardware to reach even more people giving a head-to-head competition to Apple.
The epic Motorola Fail
Six years ago, Google made its biggest purchase of $12.5 billion to acquire Motorola which quite sideways. “Together, we will create amazing user experiences that supercharge the entire Android ecosystem for the benefit of consumers, partners and developers everywhere,” said then-Google CEO Larry Page.
By January of 2014, however, Google had soured on its Motorola acquisition and reached a deal to sell the company off to Lenovo.
Why Google bought HTC’s Pixel Team?
“Google has found it necessary to have its own hardware team to help bring innovations to Android devices, making them competitive versus the iPhone series,” said Mia Huang, an analyst at research firm TrendForce.
According the reports HTC acquired 0.9% share in the smartphone market.
HTC shares were on a trading halt on Thursday. The stock has fallen around 94 percent from a peak in 2011, giving the company a market value of around $1.9 billion.
Although for Google, it is penny money, but how they use it is in the future will make all the difference. Apple, surely will be keeping their eyes open for what is about to come next. Let us keep our fingers crossed and see what Google have for us, in the near future.
Ashad Rehman
