Dennis Woodside, former president for Google’s Americas region, is the new CEO of Motorola Mobility. He will take over the position of former CEO Sanjay Jha, the man who actually planned and turned the Google acquisition into reality and who decided to step down.
“Our aim is simple,” Woodside stated. “To focus Motorola Mobility’s remarkable talent on fewer, bigger bets, and create wonderful devices that are used by people around the world.”
The deal was first announced in August 2011 and it took close to a year to be approved by regulatory antitrust commissions from both U.S. and the European Union.
Along with the Motorola acquisition, Google will gain access to over 17,000 patents and another 7,500 that are pending approval. These patents were the main objective for the antitrust scrutiny, as the merger of the two companies might have lead to them unfairly withholding patent licenses from their competitors. The takeover is thus a great way for Google to solve the issue of lawsuits from Apple and Microsoft targeting Android, the mobile operating system developed by the search giant.
Some industry experts believe that Google aims higher than just the patents, as they now have access to both software and hardware resources that allow them to compete with Apple and other smartphone developers by creating their very own integrated smartphones and other mobile devices. They might not be wrong, as Google always likes to surprise consumers around the world and let’s face it, we all need a new gadget to obsess about, it never gets boring!
No word yet on how this will affect Motorola’s PR firms, Glover Park Group & Weber Shandwick.