Here’s a bit of encouraging news for the stock market today. Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) has announced that it will acquire Motorola Mobility for $40.00 per share in cash, or a total of about $12.5 billion, a premium of 63% to the closing price of Motorola Mobility shares on Friday, August 12, 2011.
Larry Page, CEO of Google, said, “Motorola Mobility’s total commitment to Android has created a natural fit for our two companies. Together, we will create amazing user experiences that supercharge the entire Android ecosystem for the benefit of consumers, partners and developers. I look forward to welcoming Motorolans to our family of Googlers.”
This is no doubt a strategic move for Google to better position itself in the “cell phone wars” against Apple and Microsoft. The news was quite a surprise on a “Merger Monday”.
Larry Page explicates:
We recently explained how companies including Microsoft and Apple are banding together in anti-competitive patent attacks on Android. The U.S. Department of Justice had to intervene in the results of one recent patent auction to “protect competition and innovation in the open source software community” and it is currently looking into the results of the Nortel auction. Our acquisition of Motorola will increase competition by strengthening Google’s patent portfolio, which will enable us to better protect Android from anti-competitive threats from Microsoft, Apple and other companies.
Motorola Mobility Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: MMI), is headquartered in Libertyville, an affluent northern suburb of Chicago, Illinois.
