Published: September 21, 2017 |
Source:
Arstechnica |
Author:
Mark Campbell
Google pays $1.1 Billion for HTC Talent and IP
Google pays $1.1 Billion for HTC Talent and IP
It has been confirmed that Google will be paying $1.1 billion to acquire access to some of HTC’s intellectual property (IP) as well as a large portion of the company’s workforce.
This deal will see around 2,000 employees move from HTC to Google, which is around a fifth of HTC’s total workforce. Google will also gain a non-exclusive license to some of HTC’s intellectual property, with both firms agreeing to look for other areas for collaboration in the future.
HTC will still remain an independent company, with this cash infusion allowing the company to try to deliver on their future smartphone and VR ambitions, with the company looking into “other next-generation technologies”. HTC will also retain all of its manufacturing capabilities, with Google acquiring none of HTC’s factories as part of this deal.
Google will be placing HTC’s employees into their hardware organisation, many of these employees are veterans of Google’s Pixel team. This move will allow Google to design more of their future smartphone’s in-house and work towards improving their phone designs on a hardware level, perhaps by integrating AI processing components onto devices like Apple.
(Image from Ars Technica)
As a result of this deal, HTC will gain access to the funding it needs and will place it into a position where it can better focus on a more streamlined product portfolio. However, HTC will need to reverse its recent trend of decreasing phone sales if it wants to stay in that market in the long term.
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