The U.S. Department of Justice has endorsed Google's decision to sell the Motorola Home set-top business to Arris Group for $2.35 billion. This was the last regulatory hurdle that the deal faced, and now the broadband technology provider expects to close the deal by Wednesday. Arris Group is expected to use this tuck-in acquisition to improve the networking equipment it offers to cable providers.
When Google inherited Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion last year, Google was more interested in Motorola's mobile business and wasn't eager to invest in the set-top box business, especially since it didn't appear to offer much to Google's TV initiative. The deal will transfer 7,000 Google employees to Arris's employment, as well as a series of patent infringement lawsuits with TiVo, related to digital video recorders that Arris's CEO Bob Stanzione has expected to result in damages of billions of dollars.
During negotiations, Google offered to cap any liability Arris might face in the event Motorola Home is found to violate any patents owned by TiVo. Under the terms of the deal, Google will receive $2.05 billion in cash and $300 million in newly issues stock, giving it at 15.7% ownership stake in Arris upon the deal's closure. The deal will also allow Arris to license a number of Motorola Mobility patents.
Friday, April 19, 2013
Monday, April 15, 2013
Remote Display Tablet: Innovative Patent #21
Jeff Bezos, the CEO of Amazon, has filed a patent for a "remote display" devices that would take cloud computing to a whole new level. GeekWire reports that the display would get data and power from a centrally located primary station. The tablets or simple screens would not then need to include a large internal battery or significant local processing power, since both those concerns would be taken care of in the primary base station.
The patent views processors and large internal batteries as the next major roadblocks in the pursuit of thinner and lighter devices in the mobile industry. The patent claims, "The ability to continue to reduce the form factor of many of today's devices is somewhat limited, however, as the devices typically include components such as processors and batteries that limit the minimum size and weight of the device. While the size of a battery is continuously getting smaller, the operational or functional time of these smaller batteries is often insufficient for many users."
The patent also provides other use cases for these "remote displays" that wouldn't need to wait on this theorhetical wireless tablet to be developed. For example, a camera or sensor can detect when a hand is passed over a reader display and can respond by turning the page. Transferring power and data wirelessly to displays as described in the patent is currently not feasible with existing technologies, but it does present an interesting idea for the future of tablets and e-readers.
It's interesting to consider that companies can file patents with non existing technology. They are literally monopolizing an idea because they simply filed it first. I think this provides an interesting point about the patent system. Perhaps someone out there has the technology to create and facilitate such an idea but are discouraged from doing so because Jeff Bezos owns the patent to the idea itself. On the other hand, perhaps this notion of filing patents before the technology is built will actually encourage innovation and force the company to incentive the R&D of that product.
It all depends on that intention of the person/company filing the patent. If the filer is looking to maximize profits by claiming non-existing technologies and then charging licensing fees to those that do, or if it is to discourage others to innovate so certain technologies can stay relevant on the market for longer, or if they are creating incentives for their company to be the first to develop the product.
All these are valid, but only few reasons actually promote innovation while the other reasons inhibit it.
The patent views processors and large internal batteries as the next major roadblocks in the pursuit of thinner and lighter devices in the mobile industry. The patent claims, "The ability to continue to reduce the form factor of many of today's devices is somewhat limited, however, as the devices typically include components such as processors and batteries that limit the minimum size and weight of the device. While the size of a battery is continuously getting smaller, the operational or functional time of these smaller batteries is often insufficient for many users."
The patent also provides other use cases for these "remote displays" that wouldn't need to wait on this theorhetical wireless tablet to be developed. For example, a camera or sensor can detect when a hand is passed over a reader display and can respond by turning the page. Transferring power and data wirelessly to displays as described in the patent is currently not feasible with existing technologies, but it does present an interesting idea for the future of tablets and e-readers.
It's interesting to consider that companies can file patents with non existing technology. They are literally monopolizing an idea because they simply filed it first. I think this provides an interesting point about the patent system. Perhaps someone out there has the technology to create and facilitate such an idea but are discouraged from doing so because Jeff Bezos owns the patent to the idea itself. On the other hand, perhaps this notion of filing patents before the technology is built will actually encourage innovation and force the company to incentive the R&D of that product.
It all depends on that intention of the person/company filing the patent. If the filer is looking to maximize profits by claiming non-existing technologies and then charging licensing fees to those that do, or if it is to discourage others to innovate so certain technologies can stay relevant on the market for longer, or if they are creating incentives for their company to be the first to develop the product.
All these are valid, but only few reasons actually promote innovation while the other reasons inhibit it.
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