It has been a few years since Motorola cell phones have gone out of fashion. That the largest operation in the sector in the last ten years takes place to acquire a mobile phone company that sold 4,4 million smartphones in the last quarter in the US is hardly credible. In fact, the real asset of Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc. (MMI), the company's mobile phone division, are its 17 patents already filed and 7.500 in "patent pending", i.e. under examination.
And that's exactly what Google needs right now to be able to guarantee its Android operating system a secure future against legal attacks from competitors, especially Apple. In fact, the battle of the Apple is not played so much in the technological field as between the papers of the lawyers. Steve Jobs' company, which a few days ago became the first company by capitalization in the world, has hinted that it will use legal weapons against its enemies.
In recent months, the lawsuits filed by Apple against companies that produce tablets that use Android (Samsung, Motorola itself, the Taiwanese HTC) have grown exponentially and in July it even allied itself with its historical rival Microsoft to win 6.500 patents from Nortel Networks , the Canadian telecommunications giant.
In Europe Apple has got that Samsung no longer sells its Galaxy tablet and five days ago it filed a lawsuit against Motorola, accusing it of copying the design of the iPad for its Xoom tablet. In the United States, the American Antitrust is examining many other cases submitted by Jobs' company, which cannot swallow the fact that the sum of sales of all devices using Android exceed those of the iPhone.
But Google has rolled up its sleeves and is trying to guarantee greater security for its operating system and for all the companies that use it. In fact, shares of Samsung and HTC, the two largest makers of devices using Android, rose 4% and 2% respectively immediately after the deal was announced.
But something still remains unclear. Google has agreed to pay Motorola $2,5 billion if it fails to close the deal – which is expected to close early next year. For its part, Motorola would pay a penalty of only 375 million dollars.
As the intellectual property expert Florian Mueller has pointed out, the reasons for such an agreement necessarily rest on two assumptions: the buyer, even if he has huge resources at his disposal, must be "totally desperate", otherwise the seller will not could command similar terms. But if the seller didn't care so much about tightening such an agreement, he wouldn't insist on such large penalties as he would be better off looking for other operators to negotiate with instead of focusing on just one.
It is therefore probable that the giant of the network felt with water in his throat, also because rumors in the American press say that Microsoft was interested in buying Mmi. And that Motorola needed Google to defend itself from the lawsuits that Apple and Microsoft have brought against it in recent months. But now that the Mountain View giant has also secured its lawyer-proof shelter, the foundations seem to have been laid for the three major competitors to begin the real challenge, the one on products. Let the games begin.
