Lenovo Bought Motorola Mobility from Google

Thoughts?

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Guess I'm not buying Moto phones anymore.

It's a shame...Lenovo Android devices are among the shittiest out there.
 
damn was really looking at what the next gen of moto x will be. but lenovo branded???? idk i definately will get me a moto x for sure because it is an awesome phone.
 
I wonder if Lenovo landed the next two Nexus phone contract while they're at it.
 
CHANG3D said:
I wonder if Lenovo landed the next two Nexus phone contract while they're at it.
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Doubt it.

I think this is the best justification I have read - from 9to5Google

Samsung was likely vocal about the Motorola acquisition but as willing to play ball because of the perceived patent indemnification (which hasn’t turned out to be as valuable as originally thought). My theory is that Andy Rubin wanted to integrate Motorola into Google and who cares about Samsung, HTC, LG and all of the Chinese manufacturers. Rubin pushes the leadership and makes a my way or the highway type of threat.

Google chooses to keep Android, eschews Rubin, and firewalls off Motorola and says that it is another company. Alls well for the time being.

But then Motorola starts making some kick ass phones and more importantly is able to upgrade them as fast, if not faster than even Nexus and Google Play Edition Phones. People love them. Samsung realizes that Motorola is a few hit phones from Google realizing it doesn’t need Samsung and it makes a threat to move its >50% share of Android to Tizen, Forked Android, Windows or some other strategy.

Google, knowing it would be capitulating its lead in the smartphone race against an eager and resource heavy Microsoft and an ever-strong Apple bent (over) to Samsung’s whims. It promised to sell off Motorola for almost nothing. In exchange, Samsung would start making its phones look less like Samsung phones and more like Android phones. In addition, both companies would share patents, including the ones it was keeping form the Motorola deal.
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TLDR: It's Samsung's fault
 
I just got a Moto X on sale monday, I'm a little bummed. I can't imagine it will be supported after the next 6 months when the smoke clears from the deal.

Let's hope lenovo finally creates good android devices by using Motorolas talent. They will most likely keep the name (in the USA) as well because Motorola is a household name.

First Motorola, then Nokia, now Motorola again.. 2 of the best phone manufacturers are laid to rest.. Blackberry is next.
 
ComputerBox34 said:
TLDR: It's Samsung's fault
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Really sad thing is that both companies have a history of backstabbing... I seriously doubt Samsung would just sit on Tizen and merely use it as a bargaining chip/threat against Google. With Tizen, Samsung would control everything and profit. All Samsung has to do is release a bunch of high quality low-end and a mid-level phones Nokia-style, and Samsung could capture a market of WP-size relatively easily.

And Google, well, releases beta products...
 
I am shocked and confused at this news.

I thought Google + Motorla together, were going to create some super phones and awesome gadgets together down the road. I was always waiting for Google to take the leash off Moto, and let them go hog wild on a Nexus 6 phone.

Or eventually Google making their own phones, through Motorola, like Apple and the iPhone, and push it hard, and Google would buy Sprint or someone, and create their own network, with Fiber too. Then this geek woke up.
 
ComputerBox34 said:
Doubt it.

I think this is the best justification I have read - from 9to5Google



TLDR: It's Samsung's fault
Click to expand...

I am not quite sure if Tizen is the main target, since Samsung puts so little R&D while having some horrible software engineers.

Let's not forget Samsung still afraid of HTC's new Sense 6, they assist the thief on stealing the Sense 6 source code from HTC. It was both sold to China as COS (China Operating System) and Samsung for internal development.
 
Zorachus said:
I am shocked and confused at this news.

I thought Google + Motorla together, were going to create some super phones and awesome gadgets together down the road. I was always waiting for Google to take the leash off Moto, and let them go hog wild on a Nexus 6 phone.

Or eventually Google making their own phones, through Motorola, like Apple and the iPhone, and push it hard, and Google would buy Sprint or someone, and create their own network, with Fiber too. Then this geek woke up.
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+1. I was thinking Google wanted to eventually have its own in house phones ala Apple. This is such a step back from what many of us were hoping for.

Did moto x and the new moto phones sell that poorly for Google to want to cut its losses? I mean after all the Google-esque colorful rebranding of Motorola and "A Google company" thrown in for emphasis I thought things were solid. I guess the Samsung explanation makes the most sense now
 
Another major corporation goes into Chinese hands. They'[re taking over as THE major power in the entire western Pacific. And what are we doing? We're rapidly become a second-rate power with a voting public that basically doesn't know "come here from sic 'em" - and dare I say "does not care."
 
My understanding is that Google bought Motorola for the patents. They then proceeded to lose just about every patent lawsuit in every court in the world... so that was pretty much a dead dog. Considering how much money Motorola hemorrhages, the sale seems straightforward.
 
Zorachus said:
I am shocked and confused at this news.

I thought Google + Motorla together, were going to create some super phones and awesome gadgets together down the road. I was always waiting for Google to take the leash off Moto, and let them go hog wild on a Nexus 6 phone.

Or eventually Google making their own phones, through Motorola, like Apple and the iPhone, and push it hard, and Google would buy Sprint or someone, and create their own network, with Fiber too. Then this geek woke up.
Click to expand...
Makes perfect sense. See my post. To keep peace with Samsung, Google had to do this
 
Zorachus said:
I am shocked and confused at this news.

I thought Google + Motorla together, were going to create some super phones and awesome gadgets together down the road. I was always waiting for Google to take the leash off Moto, and let them go hog wild on a Nexus 6 phone.

Or eventually Google making their own phones, through Motorola, like Apple and the iPhone, and push it hard, and Google would buy Sprint or someone, and create their own network, with Fiber too. Then this geek woke up.
Click to expand...

My thoughts are exactly. Turns out this was a big bull for Google and they were not really interested in it.

Should have had kept the Moto under Google since everybody was so proud of it, and even if you decide to part it out, sell to Dell and not to a freakin Chinese company.
 
Damn I was rather excited to see what the future held for motorola under google. I thought moto x was a killer phone and couldn't wait to see what the next version would be like. Also wasn't there some modular phone concept that motorola cooked up? Would love to see this become a reality. It was a great idea. Oh well.
 
Any expectations on if we'll see the current line of Moto's offloaded at firesale prices ?
 
didactandnarpet said:
Damn I was rather excited to see what the future held for motorola under google. I thought moto x was a killer phone and couldn't wait to see what the next version would be like. Also wasn't there some modular phone concept that motorola cooked up? Would love to see this become a reality. It was a great idea. Oh well.
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That division in Motorola that was developing the modular phone was not sold to Lenovo - Google is moving it to Mountain View to be with the Android team
 
Zorachus said:
I am shocked and confused at this news.

I thought Google + Motorla together, were going to create some super phones and awesome gadgets together down the road. I was always waiting for Google to take the leash off Moto, and let them go hog wild on a Nexus 6 phone.

Or eventually Google making their own phones, through Motorola, like Apple and the iPhone, and push it hard, and Google would buy Sprint or someone, and create their own network, with Fiber too. Then this geek woke up.
Click to expand...

Then you apparently didn't understand the reason behind the purchase to begin with. Honestly, I wasn't surprised one bit by this news. I always figured it would happen.

Cwirl from CyanogenMod put it perfectly here:

https://plus.google.com/+AbhisekDevkota/posts/iyP7Hvp3qdS

Lenovo has done great with the Thinkpad line of laptops. I can see them start making quality devices through Motorola now. Lenovo sucks at phones right now because they don't know what they're doing. Now they have a company that does now what it's doing. Win-win. Time will tell but I'd be willing to bet on Lenovo.

So this week has been pure win for Google. Sell a hardware business they don't want. Keep all the patents from that purchase. Get patents from Samsung. Tell Sammy to back off trashing Android's UI.
 
Hopefully Lenovo won't run them into the ground and give us a good fast phone. With like a Snapdragon 805 quad core, 2 or 3GB of ram on Verizon so I can upgrade my original Razr Maxx.
 
Not sucked but extremely saddened. There goes another "once" great us company.

Well the company is still here, just their phone portion isn't anymore.
 
Makes me a bit concerned about the software longevity of my recently purchased Moto G. I wasn't planning on bothering to unlock the bootloader until I felt it necessary to get a new phone, but perhaps I should do that now just in case Lenovo decides to deny bootloader unlocks.

There is a small part of me that's thinking of buying another phone and selling off the Moto G, just because of my bad experience with Lenovo's Thinkpad Tablet. Honestly, though, it's not worth the hassle/expense and I'll just ride out the useful life of my Moto G.

Here's hoping Lenovo becomes a competent Android company with the purchase of Motorola.
 
I don't know why people think Lenovo is going to screw this up. For any company it is very hard to inroads into the US cell phone industry. The carriers just wont let people in for a variety of reasons. And even when they let you in they force you to the lower line stuff and to rename your device per carrier. Unfortunately for many Chinese and Indian cell phone makers this is probably the fastest way in.

I don't agree with the synopsis. I think google was always going to get rid of Motorola and they always just wanted the patents. In fact maybe samsungs power is part of what made google move the unit, they were probably thinking no one out there right now is going to compete with Samsung and Samsung may become so powerful they can wreck us. We need to give some other player a chance. Selling to an up and coming Chinese company is the best chance to create a competitor to Samsung. You think Dell is really going to do it? They have no vertical integration anymore and they are battered from the recent war trying to free themselves. HP has to have cold feet. Neither of them actually makes anything anyway.
 
HP would be the best company to take this over with but their prior management has scarred them for life as far as mobility devices. Its sad they botched their purchase of Palm so bad that now no one will ever trust HP again.

I don't know, I just don't share the same trust you have with Lenovo, I like some of their laptops and they were trying real hard by creating a x86 phone. Maybe this is their key purchase at bringing that product to us? I just hope Lenovo doesn't screw up Moto's key feature in build quality.

I think Google maintained the patents on the radio technology that Moto has maintained quite well through the years?
 
Why do you think HP will be good. They don't manufacture, they don't have any formidable IP in phones. They don't make good software, and some people would debate they don't even make good hardware. HP has very little power in the mobile space and honestly Motorola has very little as well and it shows in their products. No one every thinks a Motorola phone is the top phone to have. Because Motorola under google or other wise didn't have the power to secure contracts for the latest and best parts and priority on assembly lines. Lenovo can change all that. They have power in china and will get favors from suppliers production and the government. HP would just be begging Samsung or one of their competitors to make the phone for them. Not to mention HP has had about zero innovation in the last 5 years, all they have done is say oh look we can make our junk look like a MacBook. They would probably just copy the iPhone.
 
Hp would of been good because they bought Palm, they still have a decent amount of ip plus their engineers. As far as a corporation they have a solid production line to push anything mobile. Their half ass attempt at pushing out what they bought then instilling doubt in their products after eoling them shortly after release is what killed their future in this space.

I'm not saying now they would be a top tier choice, they could of been.

Also Lenovo isn't known for software support, their production isn't that good either. They have some premium products that they bought from IBM but that is about it.

But this acquisition will most likely not involve what has but more what Motorola currently has.
 
rudy said:
I think google was always going to get rid of Motorola and they always just wanted the patents.
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I don't think that's accurate. Yes, Google's primary reason for buying Motorola was for their patent portfolio (which really didn't end up being worth as much as they hoped). But they also wanted to give the mobile hardware business a try -- at least initially.

Some of you are quick to forget about how much Google tried to push the moto x to the public. Full page ads in newspapers like the NY Times, and USA Today. Google put in one of its own, Dennis Woodside, as CEO, and last year did the whole colorful re-branding of Motorola and giving it a new identity. Their whole attitude took on Google's; you can see it when you look at their homepage and their twitter. When my moto x boots up, it says Motorola "A Google Company" with Google's own font for emphasis. That certainly doesn't sound like a company that was "always going to get rid of Motorola."

According to this interview with Lenovo's CEO, Eric Schmidt and Larry Page started talking to Lenovo's CEO around November about selling motorola off. Coincidentally, this was right when price cuts were happening for moto x and it was pretty clear the moto x wasn't selling well and concerns about favoritisim from the other Android OEMs were probably becoming more in the spotlight -- such as when the moto x got the KitKat update before even the Nexus 4 did.
 
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