August 15th saw an Independence Day announcement of an unexpected kind, with Google declaring that it would be buying Motorola Mobility - a deal that will make it a major hard*ware player in the smartphone business, allow it to spearhead the course of Android handset development and give it access to the wealth of patents the 82-year-old company has devel*oped and amassed in its long and chequered history.


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The news of the deal comes not too long after Google lost out on the Nortel Patent Portfolio - an estimated 6,000 telecom*munication and other patents which were finally acquired by a consortium of companies including Apple, Ericsson, Microsoft, Research In Motion and Sony. The Google-Motorola acquisition is also seen as a way to bolster Google, the Android deal are numerous, the biggest being Google's possible alien*ation of its Android handset partners. Google's CEO, Larry platform, and Android licensees against the numerous "anti*competitive patent attacks" that Apple and Microsoft have recently launched.
The implications of the Page, was quick to point out however that Google would still be looking to maintain its relations with these partners and that Motorola wouldn't be given any sort of insider.