Motorola a "longtime love story" for Lenovo, courting reportedly started in 2011

posted by Chris P. / Jan 30, 2014, 9:23 AM

Lenovo may have well bought themselves Motorola Mobility's devices division in what looked like a lightning quick deal, but the story apparently goes back a few years. According to TechCrunch, Lenovo was among the competitors bidding for Motorola back in 2011, but it obviously lost out to Google's $12.5 billion offer and more attractive brand cache.

Lenovo chairman and CEO, Yang Yuanqing, is cited in a WSJ report, corroborating the idea that this was long due. Apparently, the executive approached Google's Eric Schmidt after Google acquired Motorola in 2012, expressing Lenovo's continued interest in the symbolic handset maker:

"I told him if they really want to run a hardware business they could keep it," Mr. Yang told the WSJ. "If they are not interested in the hardware business, they could sell Motorola to us."

It's not at all surprising, then, that the Google chairman was the one to approach the Lenovo chief just before Thanksgiving in 2013, testing the waters. As we now know, Lenovo was obviously still quite interested, especially since rumors have it that it was in unsuccessful talks with BlackBerry not long before that. Mr. Yang was apparently quite enthusiastic, too: "And I said yes", he told the WSJ. "This was a longtime love story." This actually means that Lenovo has been looking for a shortcut to the global market pretty much as early as its smartphone division came into existence. This hopefully means that the Chinese giant is not messing around, and has been preparing for this moment for quite some time now.

But it's not a done deal just yet, at least as far as US regulators are concerned. The deal still needs to be approved, and it is likely to go through the scrutinizing gaze of the US Committee on Foreign Investment, a body that looks at transactions that it considers to entail potential national-security risks. Lenovo is said to be unconcerned, however.

source: WSJ via TechCrunch

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16 Comments

1. ihavenoname

Posts: 1693; Member since: Aug 18, 2013

Hopely Motorola keeps that innovative spirit they got from Google. Moto X and G are awesome.

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 9:26 AM 4

5. Tsoliades

Posts: 228; Member since: Dec 22, 2012

The only tech companies I like are T-Mobile and Motorola. If stupid Lenovo screws them up or slows down updates, I'm seriously going to be angry.

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 9:44 AM 3

2. Mxyzptlk unregistered

So what was the point of Google buying them in the first place?

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 9:29 AM 0

4. Droid_X_Doug

Posts: 5993; Member since: Dec 22, 2010

Ummm. How about the patent portfolio? Also, Team Google probably had an attack of hubris and thought they could re-invent the hardware business.

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 9:34 AM 2

6. IliyaBeshkov

Posts: 261; Member since: Jul 09, 2012

Patents...

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 9:44 AM 2

7. Antimio

Posts: 313; Member since: Nov 11, 2013

The real question, my friend is, what was the point of Apple bidding for Nortel and creating the Rockstar Consortium? There's your answer :)

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 10:50 AM 4

8. corporateJP

Posts: 2458; Member since: Nov 28, 2009

Ha ha ha...hit him with an analogy he can understand! Stay thirsty, my friends...

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 11:55 AM 0

3. Droid_X_Doug

Lenovo better be concerned with the Committee on Foreign Investment. Moto has a non-trivial supplier relationship with the U.S. government. Either that business will be spun-off or fire-walled, or the deal won't get done.

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 9:32 AM 1

10. lsutigers

Posts: 832; Member since: Mar 08, 2009

Most of the government business was with Motorola Solutions which was spun-off separately from Motorola Mobility. Motorola Mobility was the division Google owned and main whose business was mobile phones. www.motorolasolutions.com

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 12:17 PM 1

9. corporateJP

And in other news, China buys another healthy slice of Americana...

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 11:56 AM 3

11. marbovo

Posts: 658; Member since: May 16, 2013

lol, that is really nice... lol

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 12:30 PM 0

12. domfonusr

Posts: 1053; Member since: Jan 17, 2014

Yep. I have previously heard that Lenovo was looking to become active in the US mobile tech market. Buying Moto is a big boost in those plans, and gets them in the door quicker and more easily.

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 1:11 PM 0

13. jiezel91

Posts: 67; Member since: Jul 28, 2011

I like this news really. Lenovo produces phones with great build quality and I can attest to that since I currently own a Lenovo P780. Very solid device with very good battery life! Probably, they would merge Lenovo's P Series and Motorola's Maxx series since both series focus on longer battery life. Anyway, good to see that Lenovo are very determined to be successful.

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 5:13 PM 1

15. WindowsiDroid

Posts: 138; Member since: Jul 22, 2013

I also have that phone and it does have better quality than any international phone brand in the same price except Nokia of course.

posted on Jan 30, 2014, 10:38 PM 0

16. fireblade

Posts: 717; Member since: Dec 27, 2013

The OS in Lenovo sucks. The update is just a dream like typical random Chinese phones, they will forget the owner of old phones. There are only few available custom ROMs and most of them are crap & flaw. Most of Lenovo phones use mediatek which has poor performance & crappy GPS. I'm done with Chinese phones. (This is a true story from Lenovo user because I'm the owner of a Lenovo phone too)