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Google has yet to apply for Chinese approval of Motorola Mobility deal
ADVERTISING BROKER Google hasn't sought approval from China for its plan to buy Motorola Mobility.
China's Commerce Ministry said it had not received an application for regulatory approval from Google following the announcement that it planned to snap up Motorola Mobility for $12.5bn. While Motorola Mobility is a US company, it is a registered business in China and under Chinese law any firm that makes more than 400m yuan in China annually must seek government approval for proposed acquisitions.
Reuters reports that Shen Danyang, a spokesman for China's Commerce Ministry said, "The ministry has so far not received any application for an anti-monopoly review."
Given Google's frosty relationship with China, which culminated with Google pulling out of China and all but relinquishing the rapidly growing Chinese web search market to Baidu, it will be interesting to see what happens when Google does seek approval.
Google's plan to purchase Motorola Mobility has been seen as the quickest and easiest way Google can defend itself against patent infringement claims made against its Android operating system. Reports indicate that Motorola Mobility holds somewhere around 20 key patents that Google could use as leverage against potential patent infringement claims from mobile competitors.
However Google will have to see what China says about its buy-out before it can bank on Motorola's patents saving it from litigation. µ
Tags: Google
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For British readers, £1 buys about 10 yuan, I think, so that's about businesses making more than £40 million a year in the whole of China (maybe excluding Hong Kong). Or around US$62 million.
At that low end of the scale, they probably could afford simply to close that business, but it isn't clear how much larger than that it is, except that the wholcompany is worth $12.5 billion to Google.
"Google will have to see what China says about its buy-out before it can bank on Motorola's patents saving it from litigation." - are their claims against Google in the Chinese market specifically, or why would Google need to wait for China's approval?
a href="www.redskyradio.com" Two Way Radio Dealer, Red Sky Radio /a
"Given Google's frosty relationship with China, which culminated with Google pulling out of China and all but relinquishing the rapidly growing Chinese web search market to Baidu, it will be interesting to see what happens when Google does seek approval."
Actually, Google has a choice to pull MotMob out of China if China doesn't like it. Google can quite simply proceed without approval, and then let the Chinese make the decision whether they want to continue to allow Motorola mobility devices to be sold in their market. Google could probably give a $h1t what the Chinese approve or don't approve.