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Google's Schmidt Reflects On Motorola Deal

  • Bloomberg, Friday, September 2, 2011 12:21 PM
A few weeks -- and a million theories -- after Google agreed to buy Motorola Mobility, chairman Eric Schmidt is talking about why the deal went down. "We did it for more than just patents," Schmidt said in a conversation this week with Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff, as reported by Reuters. "The Motorola team has some amazing products."

Still, as Reuters notes, the deal will give Google more than 17,000 patents, which it can use to protect its Android operating system. Fundamentally, Google's plan to pay $12.5 billion for Motorola Mobility is a defensive move against Apple and its highly successful mobile and tablet offerings.

Schmidt this week also praised former Apple CEO Steve Jobs, who stepped down last week, and said that he's "proud" of his stint as an Apple director. "It's certainly the best performance of a CEO in 50 years," Schmidt said of Jobs, according to Reuters. "We've all benefited from the tremendous innovation at Apple. And I say this as a very proud former board member at Apple."

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