Google buying Motorola Mobility

[answerman]

Google to buy Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion - Aug. 15, 2011

Only OT because I have to wonder what HTC's longterm path will be. Will we see more HTC phones running Windows Phone instead of Android?

 

[untitled1]

With this Motorola deal and Microsoft cozying up to Nokia, I'm a little worried that HTC might be left behind. I'd hate to see us head toward a "one platform, one manufacturer" model for the industry. But is there any platform now that loves HTC best? Nope.

 

[Deleted User]

Not really but HTC did popularize Windows Mobile back in the day. Hopefully HTC recognizes what platform actually put THEM on the big stage...

 

[gparadox]

HTC has to pay Microsoft for every Android phone it sells.... It is not be viable for HTC to continue to focus solely on Android.

 

[euph_22]

HTC has to pay Microsoft for every Android phone it sells.... It is not be viable for HTC to continue to focus solely on Android.

HTC doesn't focus solely on Android. Of the 34 phones they sell in the US, 14 are windows and 19 are android (and 1 is Brew MP, whatever that is). And they are paying $5 per phone. That's less than 3% of the manufacturing cost for a phone. If that's enough to make their business untenable, HTC has far more serious problems.

 

[_mw_]

It ain't news if people aren't panicking about it. HTC probably saw the morning paper (reader), cleared their throats and.... played a little Angry Birds. I don't think they're concerned in the slightest. I don't think Samsung is either, or um... you know, there's other people out there right?

 

[NowVoyager]

It's real. It's a smart move for Google to protect the OS. ATT is an iPhone and Windows house. They take over Tmo and get all those customers...they wield too much power to influence the industry. If they arbitrarily decide to purchase few or NO Androids...the brand could suffer. As a rule, they have ordered few Androids.

The gripe with Moto was that they locked bootloaders and made crappy overlays. Google would put a stop to that. There was nothing wrong with their hardware that a good design tweak wouldn't fix. By owning Moto, Google gets all of their patents (which includes the patent on the Cell Phone itself) and they get to be the shot caller on Vanilla Android Moto Phones. It's a win for Consumers who will want a clean Droid experience.