HTC shares suspended on Google takeover rumours http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41330814 Shares in the Taiwanese smartphone firm HTC will be suspended from trading on Thursday amid rumours Google's parent Alphabet is planning a takeover. The company issued a statement in response to a report in the China Times, and a request from the Taiwanese Stock Exchange. It said said it "does not comment on market rumour or speculation". HTC was once a major player in the smartphone market but has struggled to compete with Apple and Samsung. Last month there was speculation that HTC was planning to sell its virtual reality unit, Vive, or even the whole company. Five years ago, HTC was the world's fourth bestselling smartphone maker with a market share of about 9%. Its share is now less than 1%. Some analysts have questioned why Alphabet would be interested in buying another mobile phone maker. A way for Google/Alphabet to get into VR tech relatively cheaply? I can't like the Bloomberg Report becuase its behind a pay wall.
Doubtful, they only appear to be going after HTC's phone division rather than the company as a whole... ...where it will be gutted of any useful patents and the husk flogged off cheap to another OEM like Motorola were...
Imo they buy the phone part, and leave HTC with Vive. So HTC phone brand will dissapear, but HTC will survive. HTC phones in general were well designed, it was always the software part which brought them down.
HTC will keep its Vive and brand, then continue to develop VR/AR solutions. Goog will buy the engineers and probably move them to a new office. HTC is only product managers anyway, there's no structure left.
IP + 2000 people. Can't really understand the value personally. Google could have hired 2000 in a few months - we've got engineers coming out every orifice over here.
Maybe they specifically wanted the Pixel devs, so they can maintain the phone's current level of mediocrity.
Yup, sounds like they wanted "just the bit that makes the Pixel" without all the other failing bits of HTC. Probably wanted to avoid the situation with Motorola where they brought the company outright and then resold it keeping the bits they actually wanted.
