"Google....where companies go to die" or something like that.
What a great quote. I'll steal it.
In all seriousness, this is a company without a serious Product B, despite two decades of existence, $900B market cap and multiple expensive acquisitions. Search -- i.e., peddling advertising -- is still 8 of every 10 of their revenue dollars.
and some truth to it.
Not all that atypical for any smaller acquisition that gets purchased by a big tech tho, any company for that matter. The best parts are absorbed while the rest is sold off or dumped altogether. Seems kinda rare for one to just continue with its own identity, or even their original business plan partially intact.
“Smaller” acquisition? It happened with at least one BIG, acquisition too, where they bought a company for $13B and later sold it off for $3B (no points for guessing who)...
Not exactly.
That "bigger acquisition" was actually composed of several companies in two divisions. Motorola for purchased for $12.5B and with that it got both the Motorola Home and Motorola Mobility divisions and their related companies, approx $3B in cash held by Motorola, and tax credits of a $B give or take.
Google almost immediately sold the Motorola Home division to Arris Group for about $2.5B, then later sold Motorola Mobility division to Lenovo for another $3B . A quick bit of math and you can tell that Google paid about $3Billion for the 20K patents granted and applied for, certain other intellectual property, retained top-notch engineering talent and kept Motorola's well-regarded research labs. Just the cost paid for the IP alone seems like a better deal than the coalition of companies that purchased Nortel got for their $4.5B.
So no Google didn't take a loss of $10B as you suggest they did. In fact at worst they likely broke even cost wise but gained some great engineers and useful patents. Even blind hogs find a nut now and then.
Perhaps its now time for Apple to release AppleWatch for Android. It will expand the market for AppleWatch, in the same way that iPod did and iPhone does for Windows users.
One difference is that when Apple brought iPod to Windows, Mac had an installed base of ~20M and Windows was 750M.
Today iOS is nearly 1B and Android is 2B cheapskates who don't buy anything.
Major reason for Apple Watch to exist is to induce more iPhone sales. Porting it to Android would be fantastic amount of work to achieve the opposite of its purpose.
"Google....where companies go to die" or something like that.
What a great quote. I'll steal it.
In all seriousness, this is a company without a serious Product B, despite two decades of existence, $900B market cap and multiple expensive acquisitions. Search -- i.e., peddling advertising -- is still 8 of every 10 of their revenue dollars.
Good thing Apple has moved away from “1 product revenue” company, while Google still struggling with that with no foreseeable solutions.
"Google....where companies go to die" or something like that.
What a great quote. I'll steal it.
In all seriousness, this is a company without a serious Product B, despite two decades of existence, $900B market cap and multiple expensive acquisitions. Search -- i.e., peddling advertising -- is still 8 of every 10 of their revenue dollars.
Good thing Apple has moved away from “1 product revenue” company, while Google still struggling with that with no foreseeable solutions.
There's zero chance that advertising and marketing will be abandoned. Making less profit for some specific company providing an outlet for it is certainly a possibility but the viability of advertising as a continuing profitable service isn't questioned.
Perhaps its now time for Apple to release AppleWatch for Android. It will expand the market for AppleWatch, in the same way that iPod did and iPhone does for Windows users.
One difference is that when Apple brought iPod to Windows, Mac had an installed base of ~20M and Windows was 750M.
Today iOS is nearly 1B and Android is 2B cheapskates who don't buy anything.
Major reason for Apple Watch to exist is to induce more iPhone sales. Porting it to Android would be fantastic amount of work to achieve the opposite of its purpose.
The Apple Watch experience wouldn't translate at all to Android OS. There would be an outcry that it lacks customization, at least to the levels that Android OS users expect.
Google's version ... Sign here please ... Health Insurance Personal Advertising Account.
Were you aware Apple's iCloud is NOT approved for storing sensitive health information? Apple will not guarantee its privacy and proper storage. “If you are a covered entity, business associate or representative of a covered entity or business associate (as those terms are defined at 45 C.F.R § 160.103), You agree that you will not use any component, function or other facility of iCloud to create, receive, maintain or transmit any “protected health information” (as such term is defined at 45 C.F.R § 160.103) or use iCloud in any manner that would make Apple (or any Apple Subsidiary) Your or any third party’s business associate.”
FWIW Google does offer HIPAA-compliant cloud services and will guarantee the privacy and safe storage of that data.
Serious question; Is it stated anywhere explicitly by Apple that they will not guarantee its privacy and proper storage, or are you extrapolating that from the above? I ask because that verbiage (but I'm no lawyer) almost sounds like Apple doesn't want to be held legally liable for some Covered Entity (https://www.hhs.gov/hipaa/for-professionals/covered-entities/index.html) using iCloud to store data which then gets compromised (maybe by mishandling, by said entity), for that entity to then try to (maybe) sue Apple for it? Almost? really telling "companies" don't use iCloud for business?
Either way, its also not explicitly stated that they provide HIPAA compliant storage, so we're both not wrong.
Also, just as an FYI, not that it's wrong either, the term I think is more commonly "even a blind squirrel can find a nut every once in a while", because squirrel collect nuts. But I wonder if a blind squirrel has ever been found/documented (lol). 🤔
Fitbit issued its own press release stating, "consumer trust is paramount to Fitbit. Strong privacy and security guidelines have been part of Fitbit's DNA since day one, and this will not change. Fitbit will continue to put users in control of their data and will remain transparent about the data it collects and why. The company never sells personal information, and Fitbit health and wellness data will not be used for Google ads."
Flat-out lying. Like Nest, Instagram, WhatsApp, etc... privacy goes right down the toilet when these acquisitions take place. I was about to buy a Nest thermostat back in the day, and once I heard that Google was buying them, I immediately looked at other options (Ecobee). WhatsApp's founders said the exact same thing during the Facebook's buyout. Zuckerberg had different ideas...
Google's version ... Sign here please ... Health Insurance Personal Advertising Account.
Were you aware Apple's iCloud is NOT approved for storing sensitive health information? Apple will not guarantee its privacy and proper storage. “If you are a covered entity, business associate or representative of a covered entity or business associate (as those terms are defined at 45 C.F.R § 160.103), You agree that you will not use any component, function or other facility of iCloud to create, receive, maintain or transmit any “protected health information” (as such term is defined at 45 C.F.R § 160.103) or use iCloud in any manner that would make Apple (or any Apple Subsidiary) Your or any third party’s business associate.”
FWIW Google does offer HIPAA-compliant cloud services and will guarantee the privacy and safe storage of that data.
"Guarantee the privacy"?? Seriously Gatorguy... exactly what does that even mean? I trust Apple for more at keeping any of my info private any day than I ever would of Google.
Google's version ... Sign here please ... Health Insurance Personal Advertising Account.
Were you aware Apple's iCloud is NOT approved for storing sensitive health information? Apple will not guarantee its privacy and proper storage. “If you are a covered entity, business associate or representative of a covered entity or business associate (as those terms are defined at 45 C.F.R § 160.103), You agree that you will not use any component, function or other facility of iCloud to create, receive, maintain or transmit any “protected health information” (as such term is defined at 45 C.F.R § 160.103) or use iCloud in any manner that would make Apple (or any Apple Subsidiary) Your or any third party’s business associate.”
FWIW Google does offer HIPAA-compliant cloud services and will guarantee the privacy and safe storage of that data.
"Guarantee the privacy"?? Seriously Gatorguy... exactly what does that even mean? I trust Apple for more at keeping any of my info private any day than I ever would of Google.
It means, "What utterly unfounded FUD about Apple can I sow to distract from the fact that Fitbit users are screwed by Google's acquisition?" Once you learn his MO, his posts make a lot more sense. I think it must be very liberating for him as he is unrestrained by reality.
Pretending anyone understands the why behind the acquisition besides Alphabet executive management itself?
We don't need to pretend, we know. FitBits running on Wear OS will wind up like the Moto deal. You think we all are fools who know nothing about how Google works? Look in the mirror GoogleBoy.
No I think there's a plethora of armchair quarterbacks here who presume to have inside knowledge of why Apple and Google make the decisions they do. As far as I know the writer of this article is guessing based on... Um... yeah. That makes me just as qualified, you too.
Well, I don’t claim to be an armchair quarterback, but I have been an interested observer for a couple of decades. Google has a history of buying a company, totally botching it, and then dumping the remains. Motorola is the clearest example. Even the technology Google obtained has gone into products that, while technically good, have died in the market. The Pixel phones for example have never been profitable or top sellers. Nest hasn’t been dumped but after promising on a stack of bibles they would not use the devices to spy on the users, they changed their mind alienating a huge proportion of their customer base. I’d also point to the long long list of projects, services, and apps that Google has started, people liked, but after a few years they got bored and dumped them despite howls of protest from users. Picassa is a good example. No, the safe money based on nothing more than Google’s history, is that Fitbit will be sucked dry and abandoned. The Google product is data mining and advertising. They just don’t do anything else well.
I believe this acquisition reveals googles deep misunderstanding of its own self. We’ve seen they can make their own hardware, and technically, it’s pretty good. It’s not about the hardware. It’s not even about the software. They can do that *OK* too.
The problem is that google doesn’t know how to ask themselves the hard questions. And they can’t come to the difficult answers. Which much of the time comes down to to one simple word: “no”. Compounding that issue is the fact they are between the same rock & hard place that Microsoft is; they can build all the glitzy demo systems they want, but the truth remains - not everyone is going to buy google hardware so they have to write compromised software to run on all this myriad hardware that they don’t build and have no control over. In this inescapable reality, they can never match the seamless integration and rock solid reliability and longevity of the system created by you-know-who.
So they bought another hardware (and software) business. Great for them. Is it going to fix the problem that they have to engineer software to run on a thousand different devices? Is it going to keep them from saying “yes!” to everything, including buying hardware/software companies that aren’t going to solve their core issues? Time will tell. Or maybe it already has...
Google's version ... Sign here please ... Health Insurance Personal Advertising Account.
Were you aware Apple's iCloud is NOT approved for storing sensitive health information? Apple will not guarantee its privacy and proper storage. “If you are a covered entity, business associate or representative of a covered entity or business associate (as those terms are defined at 45 C.F.R § 160.103), You agree that you will not use any component, function or other facility of iCloud to create, receive, maintain or transmit any “protected health information” (as such term is defined at 45 C.F.R § 160.103) or use iCloud in any manner that would make Apple (or any Apple Subsidiary) Your or any third party’s business associate.”
FWIW Google does offer HIPAA-compliant cloud services and will guarantee the privacy and safe storage of that data.
Which is interesting as invested as Apple is in health care, that they don't offer HIPAA compliant cloud and messaging services.
Why do Google keep doing this? Buying a low to no profit business for too much money, which a couple of years down the line gets scrapped with Google absorbing the loss? It just beggars belief!
Comments
That "bigger acquisition" was actually composed of several companies in two divisions.
Motorola for purchased for $12.5B and with that it got both the Motorola Home and Motorola Mobility divisions and their related companies, approx $3B in cash held by Motorola, and tax credits of a $B give or take.
Google almost immediately sold the Motorola Home division to Arris Group for about $2.5B, then later sold Motorola Mobility division to Lenovo for another $3B . A quick bit of math and you can tell that Google paid about $3Billion for the 20K patents granted and applied for, certain other intellectual property, retained top-notch engineering talent and kept Motorola's well-regarded research labs. Just the cost paid for the IP alone seems like a better deal than the coalition of companies that purchased Nortel got for their $4.5B.
So no Google didn't take a loss of $10B as you suggest they did. In fact at worst they likely broke even cost wise but gained some great engineers and useful patents. Even blind hogs find a nut now and then.
Today iOS is nearly 1B and Android is 2B cheapskates who don't buy anything.
Major reason for Apple Watch to exist is to induce more iPhone sales. Porting it to Android would be fantastic amount of work to achieve the opposite of its purpose.
Either way, its also not explicitly stated that they provide HIPAA compliant storage, so we're both not wrong.
Also, just as an FYI, not that it's wrong either, the term I think is more commonly "even a blind squirrel can find a nut every once in a while", because squirrel collect nuts. But I wonder if a blind squirrel has ever been found/documented (lol). 🤔
"Guarantee the privacy"?? Seriously Gatorguy... exactly what does that even mean? I trust Apple for more at keeping any of my info private any day than I ever would of Google.