The Beautiful New World of Cellular Phones

The takeover of Motorola Mobility seems logical — Apple and Facebook could profit.

When giants go shopping, big things are on the list. For Google, the $12.5 billion purchase of Motorola Mobility (the cell phone division of Motorola) has set into motion a process that will lead to a complete reorganization of the cell phone market.

The purchase is said to be a defense strategy: Google does not have enough ammunition in the “patent war” with Apple and Microsoft to ensure the rapid rise of its Android operating system. Motorola, the inventor of the modern cellular phone, is patent-rich, but after the company almost went out of business, it is too weak to withstand Apple and Samsung.

Logical

Therefore, the takeover seems logical — if not for the detail that Motorola is one of 39 manufacturers that use Google’s Android. With the takeover, Google is now the biggest competitor of its former customer. The last [company] that tried that was Nokia, which is currently fighting for survival and has fled to the arms of Microsoft to stay alive. It is quite possible that out of that partnership there could be another merger. The company that created the Blackberry, Research In Motion, is lacking software for its platform and seems to be ripe for a Google takeover.

In any case, Google will be very busy with its unfamiliar ride from the advertising industry into the business of cell phone hardware, tablet hardware and annoying consumers. And that is much to the delight of both of its main competitors, Apple and Facebook.