Gadgetory

this episode is sponsored by lynda.com easy-to-follow video tutorials help you learn software business and creative skills go to linda.com to learn more welcome back to android weekly my name is Jason this past week the world of Android experienced tectonic shifts that's right Google sold Motorola Mobility to Lenovo and Samsung and Google cooked up some sort of a deal that means I won't be able to get to see that magazine UX I was so looking forward to thank you do you know anything about this deal that we yes that's right for those of you who haven't heard Google sold Motorola Mobility to Lenovo for 2.9 1 billion dollars and I asked in last week's Android QA for your take on that how and why did that happen and I got some pretty interesting responses it's 8 shot says Google is going bonkers Jack Johnson goes even further because Samsung got butthurt and Google had to sell moto to make babies that Samsung stop crying and messing around with Android we also had many intelligent responses one was from Akshay Paul Akshay talked about the hardware patents the need to protect their hardware partners and also the need not to compete with those partners Miguel Gonzales also has some great points that I talked about here in the show but the t-shirt goes to Kyle because Kyle brought up a point that not many others did Google wants to limit the threat of Samsung leaving Android for Tizen or other operating systems congratulations Kyle I'll be in touch with you shortly and you can give us your address and t-shirt size now I told you all I would give you my take and it goes a little something like this number one is that Motorola was bleeding money as much as everyone at Android authority loved the Moto X and the Moto G the mainstream was clearly just not taking to it I mean there was very few sales last year alone they lost boatloads of money next up is that patent price on the surface Google lost almost nine billion dollars but you need to remember that Google also sold Motorola home motorola set-top box to offset that loss so the patent cost was really about four billion dollars when you work out all the math still bad but not quite as bad as nine billion so thirdly Google has 15,000 patents from Motorola how can they make four billion dollars with money to make that all worthwhile I think it works something like this so now when people say Google is using those patents to protect Android what does that mean and how does it work it works like this Google is able to create licensing deals with their hardware partners that makes money now it doesn't make a lot of money but the real money comes from the fact that those hardware partners are now freer to create more Android devices more Android users because they don't have the same threat of frivolous lawsuits from Apple all those increased Android users makes more money for Google that is the hope that is the strategy or as a programmer Robert Eric Raymond put more bluntly this is Google telling Apple you want to play silly buggers with junk patents bring it on we'll countersue you into oblivion now no one knows that these patents will actually work as intended including Google but it does act as a deterrent and hopefully it will force Apple to the table to negotiate a long term licensing deal now for some wild guesses emphasis on the guesses China that's right the Chinese government owns a meaningful stake in Lenovo and China and Google had a spot in the past about China wanted to censor Google's search engine in China but Google was having none of that now is it possible that Google's sold Motorola Mobility to Lenovo on the cheap and the hopes of softening the relationship with the Chinese government and getting further into the Chinese market yes it is but we must remember that China has invested a lot of money in alternative operating systems so that idea may be Bunko we don't know so you remember that magazine UX we saw from Samsung at CES that I thought was so encouraging not gonna happen setting multiple sources familiar with the companies thinking the report says Google Coke Samsung to consider dumping or altering the magazine UX interface for upcoming devices it's not known yet what Google had to concede in order to get the Korean company to accept such change but the concession is probably offloading motorola furthermore there are rumors that one of the result of this deal is the death of the Nexus line according to elder murders in the Nexus line by Google is over in 2015 yes this line will be replaced by play edition now it should be said here that elder does not have a perfect record when it comes to leaks but I got to tell you my gut tells me he's right we're only gonna see Google Play edition phones no more Nexus in the years to come thank you for watching again Android army there was more news items that I didn't have time to get to but I've linked to them and below there's great stuff about the HTC One successor the LG g2 Pro there's good stuff down there check it out you don't want to forget about my brothers in android Josh Joe and the tech ninja Kevin please connect with me here on Google+ and Twitter I connect I read all of them and I answer as many as I can and also remember that we have two shows of Android Q&A coming up this week put your questions in the comments below I will read all of them and try and find the best ones to put in this week's show talk to you then